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COPUUCHT DEPOSIT. 



HISTORY 



EARLY SETTLEMENT 



JUNIATA TALLEY: 



EMBRACING AN 



^ttoitnt of tlje €aiin ^ioiietrs, 

AND THE TRIALS AND PRIVATIONS INCIDENT TO THE 
SETTLEMENT OF THE VALLEY, 



PREDATORY INCURSIONS, MASSACRES, AND ABDUCTIONS BY THE 

INDIANS DURING THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WARS, AND 

THE AVAR OF THE REVOLUTION, &c. 



By IJ. J. e[ONES. 



v^l^m 



PHILADELPHIA: 
PUBLISHED BY HENRY B. ASHMEAD, 

GEORGE ST., ABOVE ELEVENTH. 

1856. 



r^jfi 



Entered according to act of Congress, in the j-ear 1856, by 

U. J. JONES, 

in the Clerk's OflSce of the District Court of the United States for the Eastern 
District of Pennsylvania. 



\-[c>H^% 



jM 



M> ^^3 



flfHratinit. 



TO 



MAJOR B. F. BELL, 

BELL'S MILLS, BLAIR COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA. 



Dear Sir : — I hope your well-known modesty will not be shocked when 
yonr eyes encounter this notice. In dedicating to you the fruits of my 
first historical labors in the field of literature, allow me to say that I am 
governed by reasons that will justify me. In the first place, I may cite your 
well-known and often-expressed veneration and esteem for the memory of 
the brave old Pioneers of our Valley, their heroic deeds, and their 
indomitable energy and Derseverance, under the most discouraging cir- 
cumstances, in turning the unbroken wilderness into '-a land flowing 
with milk and honey." Secondly, you are the son of one of those self- 
same old pioneers, (now in his grave,) who, if not a direct actor in some 
of the scenes portrayed in the pages following, lived while they were 
enacted, and trod upon the ground where many of them occurred, while 
the actors in them were his friends and his neighbors. Manifold, indeed, 
were the changes he witnessed during a long and useful career; but the 
common lot of humanity was his, and he now ''sleeps the sleep that 
knows no waking," where once the lordly savage roamed, and made the 
dim old woods echo with his whoop, many, many years ago. 

Lastly, it was through your encouragement that I undertook the task; 



4 DEDICATION. 

and it was througli your kind and liberal spirit that I was enabled to 
make it any thing more than an tinpuhlished history, unless I chose to let 
others reap the benefit of my labors. These things, sir, you may look 
upon as private, but I cannot refrain from giving them publicity, since I 
acknowledge that your liberality has entailed upon me a deeper debt of 
gratitude than I can repay by merely dedicating my work to you. 

Allow me, therefore, to dedicate to you, as a small token of my esteem 
for you, the "History of the Early Settlement of the Juniata Valley." 
If there is any thing in it to interest the present generation and enlighten 
posterity, I am willing to divide the honor and glory of its paternity 
with you, for I am neither afraid nor ashamed to confess that, although I 
wrote the historj/, it was through your generosity that I was enabled to 
puhlisJi the hooJc. 

A careful perusal of the work will, no doubt, convince you that T have 
labored studiously to make it interesting, not only to the resident of the 
Valley, but to the general reader, who must admit that, if I have failed, it 
has not been for lack of the best exertions on my part. 

In conclusion, should the book prove a failure, and not come up to the 
expectations of my friends, you can console yourself with the reflection 
that you made a mistake by inciting the wrong man to an undertaking for 
which he was tmqualified. A pleasant reflection ! I have said, that, as 
you were the originator of the book, you should share all the hoiior that 
might arise from it. I will be more magnanimous still; if the History 
proves a mere catchpenny swindle, let the odium and execrations of a 
humbugged public fiill upon 

THE AUTHOR. 

HOLLIDATSBUEG, PA., NoV. 1855. 



PREFACE. 



The design, object, and aim of the following 
pages can be summed up without any circum- 
locution. Some ten or twelve years ago, a large 
volume of "Historical Collections of Pennsylvania" 
was published by Sherman Day, which gave a 
brief history, among others, of the counties com- 
posing the Yalley of the Juniata. This work was 
followed by a compilation, by I. D. Kupp, Esq., 
entitled "A History of Northumberland, Hunting- 
don, Mifflin, Centre, Union, Clinton, Juniata, and 
Columbia counties." The last, as far as our valley 
was concerned, w^as almost a reprint of the first, 
with some few" additions gleaned from the Colonial 
Records and the Archives of the State. Both these 
works w^ere most liberally subscribed for ; in fact, 
the compilation of the counties had upwards of a 
thousand subscribers in Huntingdon county (Blair 



6 PREFACE. 

not then formed) alone! The inducements held 
out, in order to gain such an extensive list, were, 
that the works would be graphic histories of the 
early settlement of this country. In this they 
signally failed. True, here and there they gave an 
account of some early occurrence ; but they were 
exceedingly brief, lacked detail, and in many 
instances were found grossly inaccurate. Of 
course, they gave universal dissatisfaction, because 
the subscribers looked for a faithful record of the 
stirring events which occurred when this portion 
of the land of Penn was "the dark and bloody 
ground." The descendants of many who figured in 
the trials incident to the settlement of the valley 
are still living. The fireside recitals of these 
events made them "as familiar as household 
words" among those who are now fast passing 
away ; but they search all histories in vain to find 
a faithful account of more than a moiety of the 
struggles, trials, and personal adventures of the 
pioneers, as well as the many cold-blooded Indian 
massacres and depredations which spread desola- 
tion through the land, and laid waste the homes 
and firesides of so many who located in what was 
then a wilderness. Let me not be understood as 
attempting to deny the merits of the works of 



PREFACE. 7 

which I have spoken. As modern histories, giving 
accounts, or rather descriptions, of the country as 
it was at the time they were issued, they were 
faithful records. Indeed, I will do Mr. Eupp the 
justice to say that I consider his compilation all it 
professes to be, according to his preface, in which 
he says: "A full and minute history of these 
counties can only be expected after % greater 
accumulation of historical facts is extant for that 
purpose." 

The facts necessary to give a minute history of 
the early settlement of the Juniata have been 
accessible, although it must be admitted that 
those who could give them from reliable personal 
recollections have nearly all joassed into "the 
valley and the shadow of death." 

Some ten or twelve years ago. Judge M'Cune, 
Judge Adams, Michael Maguire, and Edward Bell, 
Esq., met at the mansion of the latter gentleman, 
in Antes township, Blair county, by invitation. 
These were all old settlers, whose memories dated 
back to the struggle of the infant colonies for free- 
dom; and most vividly did they recollect the 
Indian butcheries whe;i brave Old England paid a 
stipulated price for rebel scalps. The reunion of 
these veterans w^as an epoch in their lives, for 



8 PREFACE. 

they had been children together, had travelled 
the same rugged path, and, with stalwart frames, 
sinewy arms, and willing hearts, had earned for 
themselves names, reputation, and earthly compe- 
tence. Well may we conjecture that, in fighting 
the battle of life over again in story, some interest- 
ing incidents were related. During this reunion, a 
history of the early settlement of the upper end 
of the valley was Avritten, and the manuscript 
transmitted to the Historical Society of Penn- 
sylvania, in the expectation that it would be pub- 
lished in some of their works. This, however, 
never was done ; and when application was made 
to the society for a return of the manuscript, it 
was either lost or mislaid. 

Since then, one by one, these old patriots have 
passed from time to eternity, and the woods and 
valleys that knew them for three-quarters of a 
century shall know them no more. With them 
would, in all probability, have been buried many 
important facts, had not the author of these pages 
called upon the last survivor, Michael Maguire, in 
October last, and taken down, at length, all his 
early recollections. The time was most opportune, 
for he was even then upon his deathbed. The 
sands of a long life were evidently ebbing fast, and 



PREFACE. 



he knew it, for he gave it as his solemn conviction 
that the proposed recital of the j)ast was the last 
he should ever make to mortal man. Although 
enfeebled by age, and his body wasting away, his 
intellect was vigorous and unclouded, and his 
memory fresh as it was fourscore years ago. In- 
deed, I soon found that he had the most retentive 
memory of any man I ever knew, because, in 
narrating incidents, he gave days, dates, and 
names, with such ease as almost to stagger belief. 
Of course, to him I am mainly indebted for the 
material of that part of the History treating of the 
upper end of the valley, especially the occurrences 
between 1776 and 1782. Mr. M. died on the 
17th inst. 

From a manuscript memoir of E. Bell, Esq., I 
have also been enabled to glean some useful infor- 
mation. He commenced it a short time before his 
death, and it is to be deeply regretted that a vio- 
lent attack of rheumatism in the hand compelled 
him. to abandon the work after writing some six 
or eight pages. 

1 am also indebted to a number of persons for 
information that has been of value to me, whose 
names will be mentioned in another place in the 
worlv. 



10 PREFACE. 

If this volume fails to meet the expectations of 
those kind friends who have interested themselves 
in my behalf, it will not be for lack of zeal or per- 
severence on my part. I am free to confess that 
the language of the book is not clothed in that 
attractive garb which makes books popular in the 
age we live in ; but then it must be remembered 
that I am not, worthy reader, submitting to your 
judgment a romance, but a History, based u])on 
immutable and undying Truths. 

IT. J. Jones. 

HOLLIDAYSBURG, NoV. 1855. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

The Aborigines of the Valley — Their Habits and Customs 17 



CHAPTER n. 
History of the Early Settlers ^9 

CHAPTER III. 

Juniata Island — An Indian Paradise — Rev. David Brainerd — The 
Early Settlers, Hulings, Watts, and Baskins — Indian Battles — 
Remarkable Escape of Mrs. Hulings 56 

CHAPTER IV. 

Indian Towns along the Juniata — Lost Creek Valley discovered — 
Mexico first settled by Capt. James Patterson, in 1751 — Indian 
Attack upon Settlers at the House of William White — Mas- 
sacre of White — Capture of John Riddle — His Release from 
Captivity, etc 68 



12 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER V. 



PAGE 



Early Settlers at Licking Creek — Relics of an Indian Battle — House 
of Robert Campbell attacked — James Campbell wounded and 
taken prisoner — Scout sent from Sherman's Creek — Encounter 
with Indians at Bufialo Creek — Five of the Scout killed, etc 76 

CHAPTER VI. 

Tuscarora Valley — Its Early Settlement — Its Mounds and its Forts, 
Massacres, etc 83 

CHAPTER VII. 

Fort G-ranville — Old Indian Town — Early Settlers — Captain Jacobs — 
Assault and Capture of the Fort, etc 91 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Organization of Mifflin County — Dispute with Huntingdon County 
about the Boundary Line — Riot at Lewistown, etc 98 

CHAPTER IX. 

Kishicoquillas Valley — The Shawnee Chief Kishicokelas — The Mingo 
Chief Logan 110 

CHAPTER X. 

Colonel John Armstrong's Expedition against Kittaning — List of the 
Killed and Wounded — Delaware Chiefs, Captain Jacobs and 
Shingas, etc 121 

CHAPTER XL 

Old Indian "Jown — Indian Paths — Aughwick — IMurder of John 
Armstrong and Party — Captain Jack, the Wild Hunter of the 
Juniata — Gleorge Crogan, etc 133 



CONTENTS. 13 

CHAPTER XII. 



PAGE 



Raystown Brancli — Early Settlement of Raystown — General Forbes's 
Expedition — Colonels Washington and Boquet — Colonel Arm- 
strong's Letter — Smith and his ''Black Boys" — Bloody Run — 
Robbery — Indian Massacres — Revolutionary Lieutenants of Bed- 
ford County, etc 161 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Raystown Branch, continued — Murder of Sanders and his Family — 
Englishman and his Wife taken Prisoners — Felix Skelly and Mrs. 
Elder taken Captives — Their Return, etc 175 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Standing Stone, ancient and modern — Murder of Felix Donnelly and 
his son Francis, etc 183 

CHAPTER XV. 

Trials of the Early Settlers — Their Forts and other Means of 
Defence, etc 193 

CHAPTER XVI. 
The Early Settlers— Old Hart, the Indian Trader 198 

CHAPTER XVn. 
The Continental Mills of the Valley 203 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

The Cove — Early Settlement by Dunkards — Indian Massacres and 
Captivities — Massacre of Ullery and Hammond — A Resistant 
Dunkard, etc 207 



14 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

PAGE 

Tommy Coleman, the ludian-Figliter — Surprise of the Dunkard 
Murderers, etc 218 

CHAPTER XX. 

Sinking Valley — The Lead Mines — Fort Roberdeau — Indian Murder 
and Heroic Conduct of a Woman — Encounter with a Savage — 
Massacre of Roller and Bebault, etc 227 

CHAPTER XXL 

Tories of the Valley — Their unfortunate Expedition to join the 
Indians at Kittaning — Captain John Weston, the Tory Leader — 
Captain Thomas Blair — Capture of the Brothers Hicks — Hanging 
a Tory — Narrow Escape of two of Weston's men, etc 248 

CHAPTER XXII. 

The Tory Hare — Murder of Loudenslager — Abduction and Murder 
of Mrs. Eaton and Children — Treatment of Hare by the Set- 
tlers, etc 259 

CHAPTER XXIIL 

Moses Donaldson — Capture and Murder of his Wife and two 
Children 266 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

Depredations at the Mouth of Spruce Creek — Murder of Levi Hicks — 
Scalping of his Child 270 

CHAPTER XXV. 

Stone Valley — McCormick's Port — Murder of Mrs. Houston and 
James McClees — A Dealer in Grain of the Olden Time 275 



CONTENTS. 15 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

PAQB 

Tuckahoe— Murder of John Guilliford 280 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

Early Settlement of Scotch Valley — The Moore Family — Massacre 
of William Moore — Indian shot by a Boy, etc 283 

CHAPTER XXVin. 

Woodcock Valley — Massacre of Elder — The Breckenridge Family — 
Fight with, and Destruction of, Captain Phillips's Scout by the 
Indians — Cruel Massacre often Men 289 

CHAPTER XXIX. 

Water Street — The Beatty Family — Captain Simonton — Massacre 
of the Dean Family — Captivity of John Simonton, etc 301 

CHAPTER XXX. 

Hollidaysburg — The Holliday Family — Death of Lieutenant Holli- 
day at the Battle of Brandywine — Massacre of a portion of Wil- 
liam Holliday's Family — John Holliday, etc 310 

CHAPTER XXXI. 

Old Indian Town of Frankstown — Indian Burial-Places — Massacre 
of the Bedford Scout, etc 324 

CHAPTER XXXII. 

Shaver's Creek — Mysterious Death of old Shaver — Heroic Conduct 
of two Children — Abduction of Miss Ewing and Miss McCormick 
— Peter Crum, the last Victim of the Savages, etc 337 



16 COjS-TENTS. 

CHAPTER XXXIII. 



PAGE 



Warrior Ridge — Warrior's Mark — Job Chillaway, Shaney John, 
and Captain Logan, the last Red Men in the Juniata Valley 347 

CHAPTER XXXIV. 
Conclusion 355 

APPENDIX. 
The A^alley as it is 359 



EAELY SETTLEMENT 



JUNIATA YALLEY. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE ABORIGINES OF THE VALLEY — THEIR HABITS AND THEIR CUSTOMS. 

When the persevering and adventurous Anglo-Saxon 
first entered the wilds of the Juniata, his eye, as far as it 
could reach, beheld nothing but a dense forest; but his 
quick penetration observed its natural beauties, its ad- 
vantages, and the fertility of its soil. Hence he did not 
long stand upon the crest of the Tuscarora Mountain, 
debating the advantages to be derived from making it 
his home, or the risk he was taking upon himself in 
doing so, but plunged boldly down into the valley and 
called it his own. He found it peopled with dusky 
warriors and their families, w^io received him with open 
arms; and the golden hues of hope for the future 
lightened his cares, and made his privations no longer 
a burden. On the banks of the beautiful river the 

2 17 



18 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

majestic stag trod, a very monarch; and the pellucid 
stream, from the bubbling brooks that formed it, to its 
mouth, was filled with the noble salmon and sportive 
trout, with little to molest them; for the Indians did 
not possess the j)enchant for indiscriminate slaughter of 
game which characterized their successors. They held 
that the land was given to human beings by the good 
Manitou for a dwelling-place, and not for the purpose 
of being broken up and cultivated for game. The fish 
and game were also a free gift from the same spirit, for 
the support of his people. Hence hunting and fishing 
for more than what would supply immediate and 
absolute wants were held in supreme contemjDt by the 
red man. 

The Indians found in the valley, when the whites 
first invaded it, belonged to three or four tribes — the 
Delawares, Monseys, Shawnees, and probably the Tusca- 
roras; all of whom, with the exception of the latter, 
belonged to one of the eight great Indian confederations 
scattered over the land, from the Rocky Mountains to 
what they called, in their figurative language, the rising 
of the sun. These Indians called themselves the Lenni 
Lenape, or "original people," of which the Delawares and 
Monseys were by far the most numerous of the tribes 
settled in the valley. The Shawnees, a restless, lawless, 
and ferocious band, were threatened with extermination 
by a powerful foe in Florida, when they came to Penn- 
sylvania and craved the protection of the Lena2'>es, which 
was granted to them, and they were permitted to settle 
upon the lands of the Delawares. The Delaware Indians 
soon discovered that the Shawnees were quarrelsome and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 19 

treacherous neighbors, and their company not desirable. 
Notice was given them to quit, and they settled ujDon the 
flats of the Susquehanna, near Wilkesbarre, and from 
thence they found their way to the Juniata ; and there is 
little doubt but that they were first and foremost in the 
depredations committed during the French and Indian 
wars, as well as during the American Revolution. The 
Tuscaroras did not claim to belong to the Lenape tribes, 
yet a large portion of them lived in their territory. 
They came from the South, and joined the Aquanuscliioni, 
or " united people," known in history as the Six Nations. 
As they did not speak the language of either the 
"united people" or the "original people," it would appear 
that they were people on their own account, enjoying a 
sort of roving commission to hunt the lands and fish the 
streams of any of "their cousins," as they styled all 
other tribes. 

The Conoy Indians settled in the valley in 1748. 
They left the Delaware on the strength of a promise 
made them by the proprietary government that they 
should be remunerated. The debt, however, we presume, 
must have been repudiated, for we find that an Indian 
orator named Arruehquay, of the Six Nations, made ap- 
plication to Governor Hamilton, during a "talk" in 
Philadelphia on the 1st of July, 1749, for something 
for them. The governor, quite as much of an adept 
at wheedling the savages as the proprietors themselves, 
returned the Conoy wampum, and "talked" the Seneca 
orator out of the belief that they owed the Conoys a 
single farthing, in consequence of their having left their 
land and settled among the nations of the Juniata of 



20 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

their own free will and accord. He ruled out the Conoy 
claim, and confirmed his opinion by sending them a 
string of government wampum. Whether this satisfied 
the Conoys or not does not appear upon the record. We 
think not — at least we should not suppose that they were 
half as well satisfied as the Six Nation deputies, who 
carried away, among other plunder, a quantity of tobacco 
and pipes, fifty rufiled shirts, and a gross and a half of 
brass jewsharps ! 

The Nanticokes settled about the mouth of the Juniata 
in 1748 or 1749, and in after years spread westward 
toward the Ohio. This portion of the tribe, when it 
first came to the Juniata, was not very formidable ; but it 
increased and became powerful. 

A number of Mengues, Mingoes, or Iroquois, of the Six 
Nations, settled a few years afterward in Kishacoquillas 
Valley, now Mifflin county. 

Of all the savages in the valley, the Mingoes were 
probably the most peaceably disposed, although it is a 
well-attested fact that they were a brave and warlike 
band. The fathers of the principal chiefs of the Mingoes, 
settled in the Juniata Valley, had been partially (if we 
may use the term) Christianized by the teachings of 
the Moravian missionaries, Heckwelder, Zinzendorf, and 
Loskiel ; and this may account for their desire to live on 
terms of amity and friendship with their pale-faced 
brethren. 

As the Delawares, or Lenapes, claimed to be the 
original people, we must come to the conclusion that 
they came toward the east before the Iroquois. They 
probably came from a northern direction, while the united 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 21 

people worked their way from the northwest to the north- 
east. To call these men original people, in the sense in 
which they applied it, may have been right enough ; but 
to apply the term to them of original, as occupants of the 
country, is a misnomer, not only according to their own 
oral traditions, but according to the most indubitable 
evidence of antiquarians and geologists. 

The traditions of the Lenapes were, in effect, that their 
ancestors were a mighty band of fierce warriors, who came 
from the setting of the sun, part of the way by canoes, 
and the balance of the way over land, — through dense 
forests, beautiful valleys, over lofty mountains. In their 
triumphant march they met but one foe, whom they 
trampled under their feet as the buffalo does the grass 
under his hoofs, and that this weak and effeminate foe 
was entirely exterminated. 

These traditions, vague as they are, and as all oral tra- 
ditions forever must be, have certainly a foundation in fact. 
Drake, whose Indian history is regarded as the most reli- 
able, gives it as his opinion, formed only after all the facts 
could be collected and all the traditions fully digested, 
that the Indians originally came from Asia, by way of 
Behring's Straits. 

The patient investigations made by antiquarians have 
long since settled the fact, to the entire satisfaction of most 
people, that a race did exist in this country prior to the 
advent and on the arrival of the Indians. The relics of 
this race, consisting of vases, pipes, earthenware, etc., 
found during the last century, indicate not only a race 
entirely different from the Indians, but one much farther 
advanced in civilization. The Indians, however, it would 



22 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

appear, either scorned their handicraft, or never took time 
to examine thoroughly the habits of these people before 
they exterminated them in order to possess their country. 
These relics bear a marked resemblance to those dug from 
ruins in Egypt, as well as those found in Peru. In fact, 
the vases, and some of the earthenware, bear such a strong 
resemblance to the Peruvian antiquities, that it is the 
settled conviction of some that the earlier settlers of both 
North and South America were identical, and that the 
original stock was a tribe of Egyptians. 

Some writers have asserted that these early inhabitants 
were non-resistants. This is most unquestionably an 
error. The traditions of the Indians say that their an- 
cestors fought many battles before they conquered the 
country; but that they always were victorious. Of course, 
this might be mere vain boasting by the Indians of their 
ancestors' prowess and skill in war, and such we would 
look upon it, if their oral history was not strengthened by 
the fact that, on the banks of the Miami, Muskingum, 
Kanawha, and Ohio Rivers, ancient fortifications, or at 
least well-defined traces of them, have been found. Nor 
is this all; tolerably well-executed implements, evidently 
intended for warlike pur^^oses, have been taken from 
mounds, as well as many unmistakable stone arrow- 
heads. 

Whether this anterior race existed to any considerable 
extent along the Juniata we are not prepared to say; 
but that some of them once lived here is more than pro- 
bable, although antiquarians have failed to extend their 
researches to the valley. Among the evidences to induce 
the belief that these ancients once occupied our land, we 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 23 

shall refer to the most prominent, leaving the reader to 
make his own deductions. 

When the excavation for the Pennsylvania Canal was 
going on, a laborer dug up, near Newport, a stone shaped 
like a Greek Cross. The formation of the stone bore un- 
mistakable evidence that it was not a mere freak of nature. 
This attracted attention, and the stone was thoroughly 
cleansed, when the transverse was found to contain hiero- 
glyphics, plainly marked with some shar^) pointed instru- 
ment. Persons who saw it supposed that the French 
might have given it to the Indians, and that they used it 
for a purpose similar to that for which the Standing Stone 
was used, and that they brought it from Canada to the 
Juniata. This supposition was based upon the formation 
of the stone; but, strange to say, the hieroglyphics bore 
no resemblance to any thing pertaining to the modern In- 
dians. It may, therefore, have belonged to the anterior 
race, and the person who shaped it may have been utterly 
ignorant of the fact that it was the symbol of the Christian 
religion. The cross was sent to Philadelphia to be sub- 
mitted to the inspection of the savans of the Historical So- 
ciety, but was lost on the way; at all events, it never 
reached its intended destination. 

Speaking on the subject of antiquities with a physician 
gome years ago, — probably the late Dr. Coffey, — he in- 
formed us that a skeleton was dug up near Frankstown, 
which he did not believe belonged to any of the tribes of 
Indians whose mounds are scattered so profusely along 
the Juniata. He arrived at this conclusion from nume- 
rous personal observations he made. In the first place, 
the body retained a portion of dried withered flesh, and 



24 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

portions of papyrus or bark-cloth enveloped the body, so 
that it must have undergone some species of embalm- 
ing before sepulture. Embalming was unknown to the 
Indians. Secondly, the body was in a horizontal position, 
north and south, whereas the Indians always buried in a 
sitting posture, with the face to the east. And, finally, the 
body was buried alone, while the Indian method was to 
have one common grave for all who died for years. Some 
articles were found when the skeleton was exhumed; but 
they were so much corroded as to be useless even for 
scientific investigation. 

In breaking up a piece of new ground in Kishacoquillas 
Valley some twenty-five, or probably thirty, years ago, 
traces of a well-defined wall were discovered, which was 
traced, and found to enclose about an acre of ground. 
Although the stones that formed this wall were the ordi- 
nary stones found along the stream, fashioned and shaped 
by the great Architect of the world himself, it is certain 
that human hands placed them in the position in which 
they were found. The whole thing was destroyed before 
any mention was made of it. 

In addition to these evidences, we have heard of arrow- 
heads and pottery being dug up in other sections of the 
valley; but, taking it for granted that they were all In- 
dian relics, no effort was ever made to have a thorough 
investigation of their origin. 

How long this continent was occupied by the Indians 
found here on the arrival of the Northmen is a mooted 
point, on which no two historians can agree. The Indian 
method of computing time by moons is rather vague to 
base a calculation upon. Those who contend that they 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 25 

originated from one of the lost tribes of Israel, endeavor 
to prove that they have been here for many centuries; 
while others, basing their calculations upon the usual in- 
crease of the liuma^n famil}^, think that the numbers found 
here on the discovery of the continent would indicate that 
they had been here but three or four centuries. This we 
think a reasonable conclusion, for it is an undisputed fact 
that the Indians, previous to the advent of the whites, 
multiplied quite as rapidly as their civilized brethren; 
while the tender care and solicitude they evinced for 
children and aged people induces the belief that the deaths 
among them were not in proportion as one to six to the 
births. 

We now come to the religious belief of the savages 
found in the Juniata Valley. The general impression of 
persons who have not read Indian history is that they were 
idolaters. Such, however, is not the fact. They wor- 
shipped no '-graven image." Their belief was based upon 
a supreme good and an evil Manitou or spirit, and their 
subordinates, — the former of which they Avorshipped, while 
the anger of the latter Avas appeased by propitiatory offer- 
ings or sacrifices. It is true they had images, in the form 
of a head carved out of wood, Avhich represented the good 
Manitou, and which they wore around their necks as a 
talisman against disease and to insure success in great 
undertakings; but even Loskiel, who spent a long time 
among them as a missionary, makes no mention of their 
worshipping their inanimate gods. Their worship gene- 
rally consisted of sacrificial feasts, sometimes by the entire 
tribe, and at other times by single families. In the fall they 
invariably had a sort of general harvest-home gathering, 



26 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

when bear's-meat and venison were served up, — the uni- 
versal custom being to eat all prepared. When provisions 
were scarce, such an arrangement was no doubt satisfac- 
tory; but we can Av^ell imagine that when there was an 
undue proportion of meats to guests the custom must 
have proved exceedingly irksome. After the meal, the 
monotonous drum and the calabash with pebbles were 
brought out, and those who had not gorged themselves to 
repletion joined in the dance. One of the chiefs usually 
chanted a hymn, or rather song, of irregular measure, in 
praise of the Manitons, and extolling the heroic deeds of 
the ancestors of the tribes. A second religious perform- 
ance consisted of a sacred dance, in which the men alone 
appeared, in almost a state of nudity, with their bodies 
covered with pipe-clay. This was probably a dance of 
humble contrition. A third feast, or religious observance, 
consisted of some ten or a dozen of the oldest men and 
women of a tribe enveloping themselves in deer-skins, stand- 
ing with their faces to the east, and petitioning the good 
Manitou to bless all their benefactors. There Avere other 
religious rites and sacrifices, which can be of little general 
interest to the reader, such as a sacrificial feast in honor 
of fire, another to propitiate the Manitou before going to 
war, &c. We shall, therefore, conclude this part of the 
subject by giving the story of an old trader who traded 
through the valley in 1750. Of course we did not get it 
direct from his own lips, for he has been dead and in his 
grave for many years ; but, even if we did get it second- 
hand, it is nevertheless true. 

Some time in the spring of 1750, the old trader, whose 
name has noAV escaped our memory, received a pressing 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 27 

invitation to visit Standing Stone a day or two before the 
first full moon in Se|)tember, as a grand feast was to come 
off at that time, which would be attended bj six or eight 
tribes. The trader, foreseeing the chance of brisk barter, 
brought a large quantity of goods from Lancaster, on pack- 
horses, and arrived a day or two before the sports com- 
menced. He found preparations made for a large com- 
pany; and he accordingly pitched his tent on the hill, 
while the wigwams of the Indians stood upon the flat near 
the mouth of Stone Creek. On the day on which the 
feast was to commence, the trader was awakened at an early 
hour by the loud whoops of the savages already arriving to 
take part in the ceremonies. The day wore on; and when 
the sun reached the zenith a thousand warriors and their 
squaws, in their best attire, had gathered upon the green- 
sward. At the hour of twelve o'clock precisely, a chief, 
whom the trader supposed to be at least a hundred years 
of age, arose from the ground, while all the rest retained 
a cross-legged, sitting posture. The trader understood 
enough of the Delaware language to ascertain that the 
feast was one which took place every hundred moons, to 
render thanks to the Manitou for preserving them a great 
people. After congratulating the different tribes, and 
welcoming them to this friendly reunion, an immense 
pipe was brought into the arena, which passed from mouth 
to mouth, each man taking but a single whiff. Of course 
the women formed the outer circle, and took no further 
part in the proceedings than merely looking on. Two 
half-grown lads followed the big pipe with a small bag of 
Kinnihinique, and ever and anon replenished the bowl. 
This consumed an hour, during which time there was pro- 



28 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

found silence. The old sachem then arose, and said the 
balance of the day would be given up to festivities. The 
assemblage broke up into small parties, and as each tribe 
had their medicine-men, musicians, and prophets along, 
the turn tum of the drum and the wild chant Avere 
soon heard, and the dusky sons and daughters of the 
forest w^ent into the dance of the gay and light-hearted 
with a thousand times more vigor than the beau and belle 
of the modern ball-room. 

Many of the Indians called upon the trader, and were 
anxious to barter for ^'■lum ;' but, notwithstanding that 
he had five kegs of rum, and the most friendly feel- 
ing existed between himself and the tribes, he refused 
to deal. In fact, he was a prudent man, and did not 
consider it altogether safe. The festivities of the day 
and part of the night were kept up with dancing, singing, 
and howling. The next day, religious exercises fol- 
lowed; and on the third a very solemn and impressive 
ceremony was to take place, to wind up the meeting, at 
which the trader was urgently invited to be present, and 
in an evil moment gave his consent to do so. Accordingly 
he sold all of his barrels or kegs of rum, packed up the 
balance of his goods, and started his pack-horse train to 
Aughv/ick, himself and horse alone remaining behind. 

At the appointed time in the evening for the feast, 
a large fire of dry wood was built, and the savages 
commenced dancing around it, howling, and throwing 
their bodies into the most violent contortions, first step- 
ping three or four feet forward, with the body inclined 
in the same direction ; then, throwing the body back- 
ward, moved on, keeping time with the drum and the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 29 

chant. As one party got tired, or probably roasted out, 
they danced away, and another set took their places. 
When the fire burnt fiercest, and the lurid flame lit the 
surrounding hills, a wild chorus was sung in unison that 
might have been heard for miles. This, the trader was 
told, was the loud hymn of adoration. He did not 
dispute the assertion. The rum he had sold the Indians 
began to Avork, and the old fox was enjoying some funny 
scenes not set down in the bills of the day. Occasionally 
a chief, under the wdld influence of the j^re-wafer,. would 
make a misstep and tramp upon the burning coals. To 
see him quitting in a huriy afibrded the trader an infinite 
deal of amusement. At length the pile was reduced to 
coals, when an Indian brought forth from a wigwam a 
live dog, and threw him upon the burning embers. 
Another and another followed, until ten dogs were 
thrown upon the fire. Of course they tried to escape, 
but the Indians hemmed them in so completely that 
this was a matter of impossibility. They set up a 
dreadful howl, but the Indians drowned the canine 
noise by another stave of their loud chorus. The odor 
of the roasting dogs did not sit well upon the trader's 
stomach, and, bidding adieu to his immediate acquaint- 
ances, he expressed a determination to leave for Augh- 
wick. This his friends Avould not permit,, and insisted 
most vehemently that he should see the end of it. As he 
had seen considerable fun, he thought he might wait 
and see it out, as the carcasses of the dogs would soon be 
consumed. In this, however, he was mistaken, for the 
medicine-men drew them from the fire, placed them upon 
wooden platters, and cut them into pieces. Five or six 



30 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

of them carried tliem around among the auditory, offering 
to each chief a piece, Avho not only took it, but eagerly 
ate it. The conclusion of this feast we give in the 
trader's own words : — 

"At last they came where I was sitting, among the only sober 
chiefs in the party. The stench of the half-roasted dogs was 
awful. One of them came with his trencher to me, and offered me 
a piece, — a choice piece, too, as I was an invited guest, being a piece 
of the most unclean part of the entrails. ' Thank'ee,' said I ; ' never 
dine on dog.' But this did not satisfy them. One of the pro- 
phets, laboring under the effects of about a quart of my rum, 
insisted on me eating what was offered to me. I again declined, 
when one of the chiefs informed me that it was a very sacred 
feast, and unless I partook of my allotted portion I would highly 
insult the Indians, and some of those intoxicated might deprive me 
of my scalp. The thing was no longer a joke, and I seized the 
piece of dog entrail and put it in my mouth, in hopes of spitting 
it out ; but they watched me so close that by one mighty effort I 
managed to swallow it. I did not wait to see the end of the feast ; 
I had my portion, and thought I might as well retire. I started 
in the direction of Aughwick, and every half mile the nauseous dog 
served every purpose of a powerful emetic. I was a much sicker 
man next day than if I had drank a gallon of my own rum ; and, 
in all my dealings with the red men, I took particular care never 
again to be present at any dog feast !" 

Of the social and general character of the savages we 
have many contradictions. Heckwelder, the old Mora- 
vian Missionary, whose innate goodness found 

" Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
Sermons in stones, and God in every thing," 

intimated that some of their social habits, such as their 
tender solicitude for infants and the great deference and 
respect they paid to the aged, were noble traits in their 
character. Loskiel says that " in common life and con- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 31 

versation, the Indians observed great decency. They 
usually treated one another, and strangers, with kindness 
and civility, and without empty compliments. In the 
converse of both sexes, the greatest decency and pro- 
priety were observed. They were sociable and friendly. 
Difference of rank, with all its consequences, was not to 
be found among the Indians. They were equally noble 
and free. The only difference consisted in wealth, age, 
dexterity, courage, and office." 

Their hospitality to strangers knew no bounds. In 
some instances it was carried to extremes. An Indian 
who would not hospitably entertain a stranger under his 
roof, and attend to all his wants as far as lay Avithin his 
power, was held in supreme contempt by all his ac- 
quaintances. Indeed, the offence was deemed so grievous, 
that the offender was not only detested and abhorred by 
all, but liable to revenge from the person to whom the 
common and acknowledged rights of hospitality were 
denied. 

Lying, cheating, and stealing, as well as adultery and 
fornication, were deemed scandalous offences, and were 
punished. They did not exist to any great extent until 
the parent of them — drunkenness — was introduced by 
the white man. 

To these commendable traits in a savage people there 
were sad offsets. The savage was cruel and exceedingly 
bloodthirsty. He never forgave a premeditated injury; 
and if no opportunity offered to avenge himself, he en- 
joined upon his descendants, "even to the third and 
fourth generation," to revenge him. A hatred once 
formed against an enemy could only be quenched with 



32 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

his blood. He would treasure up a wrong for years, and 
it would rankle in his heart until he got his enemy into 
his power, when flaying, roasting, or killing by inches, 
was not too cruel a death to mete out to him. Nay, 
more than this, — in their wars neither age, sex, nor con- 
dition, were taken into consideration; and the j)roud 
warrior who sang the great and heroic deeds of his 
ancestors for a thousand moons was not too proud to 
carry in his b^t the scalp of an innocent babe ! But 
then the savage was untutored, and it unquestionably 
was a part of his religion to put to death an enemy by 
the most cruel torture; neither did he expect any 
other treatment if he fell into the hands of a foe. 

In ordinary life, there undoubtedly was some honor 
in the Indian, but in war no trait of it was perceptible 
in his composition. To slay an enemy while asleep, 
or destroy him by any stratagem, was a feat to boast 
of, and claimed quite as much glory as if it had been 
accomplished by the prowess of arms. To shoot an 
enemy from ambuscade, or lure him to destruction by 
treachery that would be branded as most infamous 
among civilized nations, were looked upon as exceed- 
ingly cunning by the Indians. 

As a general thing, they professed to abhor war among 
themselves, and only declared it Avlien aggravating cir- 
cumstances absolutely demanded; — that the question was 
deliberately debated by the tribe, and if, after mature de- 
liberation, a majority of the chiefs and captains favored a 
war, speedy preparation was made for it ; a red hatchet 
or club was sent to the offending tribe, or one of them 
was caught, scalped, and a war-club, painted red. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 33 

laid by his side. Hostilities were then commenced, and 
the war waged with the greatest fury until one or the 
other party succumbed. 

Now it happens that professions do not always accord 
with practice, and in this case we are quite sure they did 
not. The whole tenor and bearing of the savages must 
lead us to believe that there was no avenue open to the 
aspiring Indian to attain honor and distinction, except 
through feats of arms and daring ; and it is only too true 
that he shared the common weakness of humanity in 
loving the "pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious 
warfare." The proof of this is that some of their most 
bloody conflicts were caused by the most trivial circum- 
stances. 

That they had many fierce and sanguinary struggles 
among themselves is well authenticated. A battle almost 
of extermination was once fought between two tribes at 
Juniata, — now known as Duncan's Island, — within the 
memory of many Indians who were living when the 
whites settled among them. This island must have 
been a famous battle-ground — a very Waterloo — in its 
day. When the canal was in progress of construction, 
hundreds of skeletons were exhumed; and to this day 
stone arrow-heads can be found upon almost any part 
of the island. 

The Indian traditions also chronicle a fierce battle 
between two tribes near Millerstown; another in Tusca- 
rora, and another at Standing Stone. The truth on which 
these traditions are based is made evident by the fact that 
at those places, for years, Indian war-relics have been found. 

There existed for years the most intense and bitter 



34 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

feuds between the Six Nations and the Lenape Indians, 
commonly called the Delawares. How long the feud ex- 
isted, or how many bloody conflicts they had to gain the 
ascendency, cannot now, either by tradition or record, be 
made reliable history. From the best information we can 
gather, it is highly probable that these confederations had 
buried the hatchet a short time previous to the landing of 
Penn. And we may also readily assume that the final 
declaration of peace was sued for by the Delawares; for 
the Iroquois always boasted that they had reduced them 
to the co7iclition of women by their superior bravery and 
skill in war. This the Delawares denied, and declared 
that " by treaty and voluntary consent they had agreed to 
act as mediators and peacemakers among the other great 
nations ; and to this end they had consented to lay aside 
entirely the implements of war, and to hold and to keep 
bright the chain of peace. This, among individual tribes, 
was the usual province of women. The Delawares, there- 
fore, alleged that they were figuratively termed women 
on this account." This cunningly-devised story the 
Delawares palmed upon the missionary Heckwelder 
while he labored among them, and he was disposed to 
give them great credit. The Iroquois, having formed 
an early alliance w^ith the Dutch on the Hudson, received 
fire-arms, and by the liberal use of them soon brought 
refractory tribes out of their confederation to terms, and 
reduced others to vassalage, and exacted from them 
an annual tribute or an acknowledgment of fealty, per- 
mitting them, on such conditions, to occupy certain 
hunting-grounds; and there must, therefore, have been 
at least some truth in the allegation of the Iroquois 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 35 

that the Delawares were "conquered by their arms, and 
were compelled to this humiliating concession as the only 
means of averting impending destruction." It is said, 
however, that the Delawares were finally enabled to throw 
ofi" this galling yoke, through the influence of Zeedyusung, 
a powerful chief, who extorted from the Iroquois an ac- 
knowledgment of their independence at a treaty held at 
Tioga in 1756. 

" The humiliation of tributary nations was, however, tempered 
with a paternal regard for their interests in all negotiations with 
the whites ; and care was taken that no trespasses should be com- 
mitted on their rights, and that they should be justly dealt with." 

So says the record; and yet we find that the sachems 
of the Six Nations, who had evidently learned from the 
whites both the use and abuse of money, in July, 1754, at 
Albany, sold all the lands in the State, not previously pur- 
chased, "lying southwest of a line beginning one mile 
above the mouth of Penn's Creek, and running northwest- 
by-west to the western boundary of the State." This 
sold the land from under the feet of the Delawares, Shaw- 
nees, and Monseys, of the Juniata Valley, notwithstand- 
ing the Six Nations had guaranteed it to them forever as 
a sacred hunting-ground. This act of treachery on the 
part of the Iroquois, and the insatiate appetite of the pro- 
prietors to add broad acres to their extensive domain, 
caused many of these homeless tribes to go over to the 
French, and, as a writer truly adds, " the blood of Brad- 
dock's soldiers was added to the price of the land." 

But to return to the original settlement of the valley. 
The Indians unquestionably received the white adven- 
turers with open arms, and extended to them such a 



36 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

hearty welcome as must have banished all fears for the 
future. The savages looked upon the death-dealing rifle 
with superstitious awe; and the saw, the axe, the plane, 
and other implements of handicraft in the possession of 
the whites, made them a high order of beings, endowed 
with peculiar gifts by the Great Spirit, in the eyes of the 
Indians, and their persons were regarded as sacred. They 
shared with them their rude huts, and left nothing un- 
done within their power to render them comfortable. 

And for this noble and magnanimous conduct on the 
part of the Indian, what return did the white man make ? 
Such a one only, we regret to say, as makes no bright 
page in their history. They were taught all the vices of 
civilization, but to teach them its virtues was deemed a 
work of supererogation. The ignorant Indian and his 
primitive habits were treated with disdain, and he was 
deemed a fit subject for robbery whenever oj)portunity 
offered — this more especially by the lawless, who considered 
themselves out of the reach of government and its officers. 
A gradual encroachment upon the Indian's sacred hunting- 
grounds, and the refusal of the white man to look upon him 
as any thing but a degraded being or to associate with 
him on an equality, soon taught the Indian that he had 
taken into fellowship the crafty white man only to enable 
him to suck out his existence by his superior skill and 
his subtle cunning. The keen penetration of the savage 
soon discovered the position he occupied by the side of 
his white brother. Smarting under the indignities offered, 
and foreseeing the degradation to which he would be sub- 
jected in time, the red man and the white man did not 
long dwell together in unity. While the latter com- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 37 

menced tilling the land and surrounding himself with the 
comforts of civilization, the former fled before him to the 
mountains and valleys where he was monarch of the 
land, — where the council-fire could blaze, the green-corn 
dance and song be heard, and the calumet of peace be 
smoked without the presence of the white man. 

Yet, with all the encroachments upon their rights by 
the settlers, the Indians exercised great forbearance. 
They knew the warlike appliances in the power of the 
proprietary government; hence they repeatedly declared 
their wish to "keep bright the chain of friendship;" — in 
less figurative language, they did not want to go to war. 
No depredations were committed upon the whites, of any 
consequence, before the French tampered with them and 
the Six Nations perfidiously sold the land they had given 
"their cousins" as a sacred hunting-ground. Nor even 
then, although the aggravation was great, did all the In- 
dians leave the valley to join the French. Many who 
were friendly toward the proprietary government re- 
mained until war broke out between the colonies and 
Great Britain ; and some few peaceably-disposed fragments 
of tribes even lingered in the valley until the close of the 
Revolutionary war. 

During the French and Indian war, and at its close, 
many of the Indians returned, and lived for some years in 
the valley unmolested. But in 1761-62 the footprints of 
the white man were seen in their paths, and civilization 
began to crowd them. The white adventurers crowded 
so thick upon them, that, after the war of 1764, the 
greater portion of them left; nor did they return again 
until 1777, when they appeared as allies to the British 



38 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

crown, to massacre and scalp the unprotected frontier- 
men. To stimulate them to this inhuman warfare, the 
British not only impressed it upon them that they were 
redressing grievances, but they actually paid them a stipu- 
lated price for every scalp, of child as well as adult, 
brought to the Canadian frontier. 

The Indians who figured in the predatory incursions 
from 1776 to 1781 were probably Delawares, Monseys, 
Nanticokes, Shawnees, and Tuscaroras; but they were 
then only known as Delawares, all other titles having 
been merged into that of the most powerful tribe. That 
these tribes were the ones who committed most of the 
depredations, we judge from the fact that the elder chiefs 
and captains emigrated to the Canadian frontier from the 
Juniata Valley, and consequently knew every foot of the 
valley, from the base of the Alleghany Mountains to the 
very mouth of the river. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 39 



CHAPTEE 11. 

HISTORY OF THE EARLY SETTLERS. 

It appears from all authentic evidence that white 
traders ventured into the valley as early as 1740, but 
always left again after transacting their business. It was 
about the year 1741 that bold and daring men pushed 
into the valley with the evident determination of making 
it their home. They were nearly all Scotch-Irish, — a 
hardy race of devout Christians, whose ancestors had been 
persecuted in the north of Scotland, by Charles I., and 
driven to the north of Ireland, and who, fearful of the 
provisions of the Schism Bill, in their turn fled from 
Ireland to America, between the years 1714 and 1720. 
The first of them located near or about the line (then in 
dispute) between Maryland and Pennsylvania. Logan, 
the secretary of the province, who was probably an 
adherent to the religion professed by the pro23rietors, 
was very much annoyed at the Scotch-Irish assumption 
and maintenance of " squatter's rights." In a letter to 
the Provincial Government, in 1724, he said, "They (the 
Scotch-Irish and Scotch) have generally taken up the 
western lands ; and as they rarely approach me to propose 
to purchase, I look upon them as bold and indigent stran- 
gers, giving as their excuse, when challenged for titles, 
that we had solicited for colonists, and they had come 
accordingly." 



40 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Notwithstanding this, they were not molested, for they 
were exempted from the payment of rents by an ordi- 
nance passed in 1720, in consequence of their being 
frontier-men, and forming a cordon of defence to the 
colony. 

Logan, it must be admitted, had no friendly feeling 
toward the new comers. In 1725 he stated that they 
had taken possession of one thousand acres of land, reso- 
lutely sat down and imj)roved it without having any right 
to it, and he expressed himself much at a loss to deter- 
mine how to dispossess them. On this occasion he 
admitted that among them were a number of Germans. 

In 1730, Logan w^rote to the government, or probably 
the proprietors, complaining of the Scotch-Irish, in an 
audacious and disorderly manner, possessing themselves 
of the whole of Conestoga Manor, of fifteen thousand acres, 
being the best land in the country. In doing this by 
force, they alleged that it was against the laws of God and 
nature that so much land should be idle while so many 
Christians wanted it to labor on and raise their bread. 
They were finally dispossessed by the sheriff* and his 
posse, and their cabins, to the number of thirty, were 
burned. 

These men apparently held in contempt the sham pur- 
chases of Penn from the Indians ; asserted that the treaties 
by which the lands were secured to the proprietors w^ere 
nothing more than downright farces; and they justified 
their course by assuming that if the Penn family had a 
right to '■'■ jillibuster'' on an extensive scale, the same right 
to enjoy enough land to support their families should not 
be denied them. If the disciples of George Fox, by craft 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 41 

and cunning, could obtain from the Indians thousands 
upon thousands of acres of land by a royal grant and the 
presentation of baubles that shamed the idea of a purchase, 
the disciples of John Calvin thought they had an equal 
right to possess themselves of at least a portion of the 
acres wrested by stratagem from the Indians. They con- 
sidered the Penns usurpers and pretenders, and despised 
their feudal prerogatives which gave them pomp and cir- 
cumstance, and refused to pay them the quit-rents, 
which enabled them to rule by deputy, and riot in the 
luxury of aristocratic life in England, rather than adopt 
the unostentatious manners of the new world. 

Logan's successor was Richard Peters. He, too, was 
deeply devoted to the proprietors, and used his utmost 
exertions to get quit-rents out of the squatters. Failing 
to do so peaceably, he went to Marsh Creek, then in Lan- 
caster county, for the express purpose of dispossessing 
them, and measuring the lands of the manor. This 
occurred in 1743. The squatters assembled in great force, 
notwithstanding the secretary was accompanied by the 
sheriff and a magistrate, and forbade Peters to proceed. 
On his refusal, the chain was broken, and demonstrations 
of a riot made, whereupon the surveying party retired. 
The settlers were afterward indicted, but the matter was 
compromised by the secretary granting them leases on 
very favorable terms. 

From the counties of Chester and Lancaster, these set- 
tlers gradually worked their way to the west, and about 
1748 the Kittochtinny Valley was tolerably well settled. 
The influx of emigrants from Europe — embracing Irish, 
Scotch, Scotch-Irish, German, and a few English — was so 



42 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

great, that it followed, as a matter of course, that the 
Juniata Valley was in its turn soon invaded. 

There, in all probability, the proprietors would have 
suffered them to remain, as they knew little of, and cared 
less, about the land ; but the Indians made complaint of 
the aggressions. The Six Nations took the matter in 
hand, and declared that usurping the lands they had 
guaranteed to their cousins, the Delawares, as a sacred 
hunting-ground, was a breach of faith, and that the settlers 
must be removed ; or, if the settlers persisted in their 
encroachments, the Delawares would take up the hatchet 
against them. Only too glad to get rid of their settlers iu 
the lower counties, the government made little effort to 
remove them from the Indian lands. True, to satisfy the 
Indians, they issued proclamations warning squatters to 
keep off these lands, under certain penalties which they 
knew could not be executed- 

These usurpations of land, and the contumely with 
which the settlers treated the Indians, at length threat- 
ened serious consequences. The Delawares, as well as 
the Six Nations, made complaints such as could not be 
misunderstood. The proprietors, at length alarmed at 
the probable consequences of letting their squatters usurp 
the lands or hunting-grounds of the Indians, sent Peters 
and others to dispossess them. The following is Secretary 
Peters's report, sent to Governor Hamilton in 1750 : — 

TO JAMES HAMILTON, ESQ., GOVERNOR OF PENNSYLVANIA. 

May it please your honor, Mr. Weiser and I having received 
your honor's orders to give mforination to the proper magistrates 
against all such as had presumed to settle on the lands beyond 
the Kittochtinny Mountains not purchased of the Indians, in con- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 43 

tempt of the laws repeatedly signified by proclamations, and par- 
ticularly by your honor's last one, and to bring them to a legal 
conviction, lest for want of their removal a breach should ensue 
between the Six Nations of Indians and this Province, we set 
out on Tuesday, the 15th of May, 1750, for the new county of 
Cumberland, where the places on which the trespassers had 
settled lay. 

At Mr. Croghan's we met with five Indians, — three from 
Shamokin, two of which were sons of the late Shickcalamy, who 
transact the business of the Six Nations with this government ; 
two were just arrived from Alleghany, viz., one of the Mohawk's 
nation, called Aaron, and Andrew Montour, the interpreter at 
Ohio. Mr. Montour telling us he had a message from the Ohio 
Indians and Twightwees to this government, and desiring a con- 
ference, one was held on the 18th of May last, in the presence of 
James Galbreath, George Croghan, William Wilson, and Hermanus 
Alricks, Esqrs., justices of the county of Cumberland ; and when 
Mr. Montour's business was done, we, with the advice of the other 
justices, imparted to the Indians the design we were assembled 
upon ; at which they expressed great satisfaction. 

Another conference was held, at the instance of the Indians, in 
the presence of Mr. Galbreath and Mr. Croghan, before mentioned, 
wherein they expressed themselves as follows : — 

" Brethren, — We have thought a great deal of what you imparted 
to us, that ye were come to turn the people off who are settled 
over the hills ; we are pleased to see you on this occasion ; and, as 
the council of Onondago has this afiair exceedingly at heart, and 
it was particularly recommended to us by the deputies of the Six 
Nations when they parted from us last summer, we desire to 
accompany you. But we are afraid, notwithstanding the care of the 
governor, that this may prove like many former attempts. The 
people will be put off now, and next year come again ; and if so, 
the Six Nations will no longer bear it, but do themselves justice. 
To prevent this, therefore, when you shall have turned the people 
off, we recommend it to the governor to place two or three faithful 
persons over the mountains who may be agreeable to him and us, 
with commissions empowering them immediately to remove every 
one who may presume after this to settle themselves, until the Six 
Nations shall agree to make sale of their land." 



44 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

To enforce this they gave a string of wampum, and received one 
in return from the magistrates, with the strongest assurances that 
they would do their duty. 

On Tuesday, the twenty-second of May, Matthew Dill, George 
Croghan, Benjamin Chambers, Thomas Wilson, John Finley, and 
James Galbreath, Esqrs., justices of the said county of Cumberland, 
attended by the under-sheriff, came to Big Juniata, situate at the 
distance of twenty miles from the mouth thereof, and about ten 
miles north from the Blue Hills — a place much esteemed by the 
Indians for some of their best hunting-ground ; and there they 
found five cabins or log-houses ; one possessed by William White, 
another by George Cahoon, another not quite yet finished, in 
possession of David Hiddleston, another possessed by George and 
William Galloway, and another by Andrew Lycon. Of these 
persons, William White and George and William Galloway, David 
Hiddleston, and George Cahoon, appeared before the magistrates, 
and, being asked by what right or authority they had possessed 
themselves of those lands and erected cabins thereon, they replied, 
by no right or authority, but that the land belonged to the pro- 
prietaries of Pennsylvania. They then were asked whether they 
did not know that they were acting against the law, and in contempt 
of frequent notices given them by the governor's proclamation ? 
They said they had seen one such proclamation, and had nothing 
to say for themselves, but craved mercy. Hereupon the said 
William White, George and William Galloway, David Hiddleston, 
and George Cahoon, being convicted by said justices on their view, 
the under-sheriff was charged with them, and he took William 
White, David Hiddleston, and George Cahoon into custody; but 
George and William Galloway resisted, and having got at some 
distance from the under-sheriff, they called to us, " You may take 
our lands and houses, and do what you please with them ; we 
deliver them to you with all our hearts, but Ave will not be carried 
to jail !" 

The next morning, being Wednesday, the twenty-third of May, 
the said justices went to the log-house or cabin of Andrew Lycon, 
and finding none there but children, and hearing that the father 
and mother were expected soon, and William White and others 
offering to become security jointly and severally, and to enter into 
recognisance as well for Andrew's appearance at court and imme- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 45 

diate removal as for their own, this proposal was accepted, and 
William White, David Hiddleston, and George Cahoon entered into 
a recognisance of one hundred pounds, and executed bonds to the 
proprietaries in the sum of five hundred pounds, reciting that they 
were trespassers, and had no manner of right, and had delivered 
possession to me for the proprietaries. When the magistrates 
went to the cabin or log-house of George and William Galloway, 
(which they had delivered up as aforesaid the day before, after 
they were convicted, and were flying from the sheriff,) all the goods 
belonging to the said George and William were taken out, and the 
cabin being quite empty, I took possession thereof for the proprie- 
taries ; and then a conference was held what should be done with 
the empty cabin ; and after great deliberation, all agreed that if 
some cabins were not destroyed, they would tempt the trespassers 
to return again, or encourage others to come there should these 
trespassers go away; and so what was doing would signify 
nothing, since the possession of them was at such a distance from 
the inhabitants, could not be kept for the proprietaries ; and Mr. 
Weiser also giving it as his opinion that, if all the cabins were left 
standing, the Indians would conceive such a contemptible opinion 
of the government that they would come themselves in the winter, 
murder the people, and set their houses on fire. On these con- 
siderations the cabin, by my order, was burnt by the under-sheriff 
and company. 

Then the company went to the house possessed by David 
Hiddleston, who had entered into bond as aforesaid ; and he 
having voluntarily taken out all the things which were in the 
cabin, and left me in possession, that empty and unfurnished 
cabin was likewise set on fire by the under-sheriff, by my 
order. 

The next day, being the twenty-fourth of May, Mr. Weiser and 
Mr. Galbreath, with the under-sheriff and myself, on our way to 
the mouth of the Juniata called at Andrew Lycon's, with intent 
only to inform him that his neighbors were bound for his appear- 
ance and immediate removal, and to caution him not to bring him 
or them into trouble by a refusal ; but he presented a loaded gun 
to the magistrates and sheriff; said he would shoot the first man 
that dared to come nigher. On this he was disarmed, convicted, 
and committed to the custody of the sheriff. This whole transac- 



46 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

tion happened in the sight of a tribe of Indians who had by acci- 
dent in the night time fixed their tent on that plantation ; and 
Lycon's behavior giving them great offence, the Shickcalamies 
insisted on our burning the cabin, or they would do it themselves. 
Whereupon every thing was taken out of it, (Andrew Lycon all the 
while assisting,) and, possession being delivered to me, the empty 
cabin was set on fire by the under-sheriff, and Lycon was carried 
to jail. 

Mr. Benjamin Chambers and Mr. George Croghan had about an 
hour before separated from us ; and on meeting them again in 
Cumberland county, they reported to me they had been at Sheer- 
man's creek, or Little Juniata, situate about six miles over the Blue 
Mountain, and found there James Parker, Thomas Parker, Owen 
McKeib, John McClare, Richard Kirkpatrick, James Murray, John 
Scott, Henry Gass, John Cowan, Simon Girtee, and John Kilough, 
who had settled lands and erected cabins or log-houses thereon ; and 
having convicted them of the trespass on their view, they had bound 
them, in recognisances of the penalty of one hundred pounds, to ap- 
pear and answer for their trespasses on the first day of the next county 
court of Cumberland, to be held at Shippensburgh ; and that the 
said trespassers had likewise entered into bonds to the proprie- 
taries, in five hundred pounds penalty, to remove off immediately, 
with all their servants, cattle, and effects, and had delivered pos- 
session of their houses to Mr. George Stevenson for the proprie- 
taries' use ; and that Mr. Stevenson had ordered some of the 
meanest of those cabins to be set on fire, where the families were 
not large nor the improvements considerable. 

On Monday, the twenty-eighth of May, we were met at 
Shippensburgh by Samuel Smith, William Maxwell, George Cro- 
ghan, Benjamin Chambers, William Allison, William Trent, John 
Finley, John Miller, Hermanus Alricks, and James Galbreath, 
Esquires, justices of Cumberland county, who informed us that the 
people in the Tuscarora Path, in Big Cove, and at Aucquick, 
would submit. Mr. Weiser most earnestly pressed that he might 
be excused any further attendance, having abundance of necessary 
business to do at home ; and the other magistrates, though with 
much reluctance, at last consenting, he left us. 

On Wednesday, the thirtieth of May, the magistrates and 
company being detained two days by rain, proceeded over the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNLiTA VALLEY. 47 

Kittochtinny Mountains and entered into the Tuscarora Path or 
Path Valley, through which the road to Alleghany lies. Many 
settlements were formed in this valley, and all the people were 
sent for, and the following persons appeared, viz. : Abraham Slach/ 
James Blair, Moses Moore, Arthur Dunlap, Alexander McCartie, 
David Lewis, Adam McCartie, Felix Doyle, Andrew Dunlap, 
Robert Wilson, Jacob Pyatt, Jr., William Ramage, Reynolds 
Alexander, Robert Baker, John Armstrong, and John Potts ; who 
were all convicted by their own confession to the magistrates of 
the like trespasses with those at Sheerman's Creek, and were 
bound in the like recognisances to appear at court, and bonds to 
the proprietaries to remove with all their families, servants, 
cattle, and effects; and having voluntarily given possession of 
their houses to me, some ordinary log-houses, to the number of 
eleven, were burnt to the ground ; the trespassers, most of 
them cheerfully, and a very few of them with reluctance, carrying 
out all their goods. Some had been deserted before, and lay waste. 

At Aucquick, Peter Falconer, Nicholas De Long, Samuel Perry, 
and John Charleton, were convicted on the view of the magistrates, 
and having entered into like recognisances and executed the like 
bonds, Charleton's cabin was burnt, and fire set to another that was 
just begun, consisting only of a few logs piled and fastened to one 
another. 

The like proceedings at Big Cove (now within Bedford county) 
against Andrew Donnaldson, John MacClelland, Charles Stewart, 
James Downy, John MacMean, Robert Kendell, Samuel Brown, 
William Shepperd, Roger Murphy, Robert Smith, William Dickey, 
William Millican, William MacConnell, James Campbell, William 
Carrell, John Martin, John Jamison, Hans Patter, John MacCollin, 
James Wilson, and John Wilson ; who, coming before the magis- 
trates, were convicted on their own confession of the like tres- 
passes, as in former cases, and were all bound over in like 
recognisances and executed the like bond to the proprietaries. 
Three waste cabins of no value were burnt at the north end of 
the Cove by the persons who claimed a right to them. 

The Little Cove (in Franklin county) and the Big and Little 
Conolloways being the only places remaining to be visited, as this 
was on the borders of Maryland, the magistrates declined going 
there, and departed for their homes. 



48 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

About the year 1740 or 1741, one Frederick Star, a German, 
with two or three more of his countrymen, made some settlements 
at the place where we found William White, the Galloways, 
and Andrew Lycon, on Big Juniata, situate at the distance of 
twenty miles from the mouth thereof, and about ten miles north 
of the Blue Hills, — a place much esteemed by the Indians for 
some of their best hunting ground ; which (German settlers) were 
discovered by the Delawares at Shamokin to the deputies of the 
Six Nations as they came down to Philadelphia in the year 1742, 
to hold a treaty with this government ; and they were disturbed at, 
as to inquire with a peculiar warmth of Governor Thomas if these 
people had come there by the orders or with the privilege of the 
government ; alleging that, if it was so, this was a breach of the 
treaties subsisting between the Six Nations and the proprietor, 
William Penn, who in the most solemn manner engaged to them 
not to suffer any of the people to settle lands till they had 
purchased from the Council of the Six Nations. The governor, as 
he might with great truth, disowned any knowledge of those persons' 
settlements ; and on the Indians insisting that they should be im- 
mediately thrown over the mountains, he promised to issue his 
proclamation, and, if this had no effect, to put the laws in exe- 
cution against them. The Indians, in the same treaty, publicly 
expressed very severe threats against the inhabitants of Maryland 
for settling lands for which they had received no satisfaction, and 
said that if they would not do them justice they would do justice to 
themselves, and would certainly have committed hostilities if a 
treaty had not been under foot between Maryland and the Six 
Nations, under the mediation of Governor Thomas ; at which the 
Indians consented to sell lands and receive a valuable consideration 
for them, which put an end to the danger. 

The proprietaries were then in England; but observing, on 
perusing the treaty, with what asperity they had expressed them- 
selves against Maryland, and that the Indians had just cause to 
complain of the settlements at Juniata, so near Shamokin, they 
wrote to their governor, in very pressing terms, to cause those 
trespassers to be immediately removed ; and both the proprietaries 
and governor laid these commands on me to see this done, which I 
accordingly did in June, 1743, the governor having first given them 
notice by a proclamation served on them. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 49 

At that time none had presumed to settle at a place called the Big 
Cove — having this name from its being enclosed in the form of a 
basin by the southernmost range of the Kittochtinny Hills and 
Tuscarora Hills ; which last end here, and lose themselves in other 
hills. This Big Cove is about five miles north of the temporary 
line, and not far west of the place where the line terminated. Be- 
tween the Big Cove and the temporary line lies the Little Cove, — ■ 
so called from being likewise encircled with hills ; and to the west 
of the Little Cove, toward Potowmec, lie two other places, called 
the Big and Little Conollaways, all of them situate on the tempo- 
rary line, and all of them extended toward the Potowmec. 

In the year 1741 or 1742 information Avas likewise given that 
people were beginning to settle in those places, some from Mary- 
land and some from this province. But as the two governments 
were not then on very good terms, the governor did not think 
proper to take any other notice of these settlements than to send 
the sheriff to serve his proclamation on them, though they had 
ample occasion to lament the vast inconveniences which attend un- 
settled boundaries. After this the French war came on, and the 
people in those parts, taking advantage of the confusion of the 
times, by little and little stole into the Great Cove ; so that at the 
end of the war it was said thirty families had settled there ; not, 
however, without frequent prohibitions on the part of the govern- 
ment, and admonitions of the great danger they run of being cut 
off by the Indians, as these settlements were on lands not purchased 
of them. At the close of the war, Mr. Maxwell, one of the justices 
of Lancaster county, delivered a particular message from this 
government to them, ordering their removal, that they might not 
occasion a breach with the Indians, but it had no effect. 

These were, to the best of my remembrance, all the places set- 
tled by Pennsylvanians in the unpurchased part of the province, till 
^ about three years ago, when some persons had the presumption to 
go into Path Valley or Tuscarora Gap, lying to the east of the Big 
Cove, and into a place called Aucquick, lying to the northward of 
it; and likewise into a place called Sheerman's creek, lying along 
the waters of Juniata, and is situate east of the Path Valley, 
through which the present road goes from Harris's Ferry to Alle- 
ghany ; and lastly, they extended their settlements to Big Juniata ; 
the Indians all this while repeatedly complaining that their hunting- 

4 



50 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

ground was every day more and more taken from them ; and that 
there must infallibly arise quarrels between their warriors and these 
settlers, which would in the end break the chain of friendship, and 
pressing in the most importunate terms their speedy removal. 
The government in 1748 sent the sheriff and three magistrates, 
with Mr. Weiser, into these places to warn the people ; but they, 
notwithstanding, continued their settlements in opposition to all 
this; and, as if those people were prompted by a desire to make 
mischief, settled lands no better, nay not so good, as many vacant 
lands within the purchased parts of the province. 

The bulk of these settlements were made during the administra- 
tion of President Palmer; and it is well known to your honor, 
though then in England, that his attention to the safety of the 
city and the lower counties would not permit him to extend more 
care to places so remote. 

Finding such a general submission, except the two Galloways 
and Andrew Lycon, and vainly believing the evil would be effectu- 
ally taken away, there was no kindness in my power which I did 
not do for the offenders. I gave them money where they were 
poor, and telling them they might go directly on any part of the 
two millions of acres lately purchased of the Indians; and where 
the families were large, as I happened to have several of my own 
plantations vacant, I offered them to stay on them rent free, till 
they could provide for themselves : then I told them that if after 
all this lenity and good usage they would dare to stay after the 
time limited for their departure, no mercy would be shown them, 
but that they would feel the rigor of the law. 

It may be proper to add that the cabins or log-houses which 
were burnt were of no considerable value; being such as the 
country people erect in a day or two, and cost only the charge of 
an entertainment. Richaed Peters. 

July 2, 1750. 

From tliis summary proceeding originated the name of 
the j)lace called the Burnt Cabins, the locality of which is 
pointed out to the traveller to this day. 

That these ejected tenants at will did not remain perma- 
nently ejected from the fertile valley of the Juniata is 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 51 

evident from the fact that their descendants, or many of 
them, of the third and fourth generations, are now occu- 
pying the very lands they were driven from. 

In July, 1750, the government Avas thrown into alarm 
by the rumor that a Mr. Delany had, while speaking of 
the removal of the trespassers on the unpurchased lands 
northwest of the Kittochtinny Hills, said, "that if the 
jDCople of the Great and Little Coves would apply to 
Maryland they might have warrants for their lands; and 
if those of the Tuscarora Path Valley would apply to Vir- 
ginia, he did not doubt but they might obtain rights 
there." 

Petitions were sent to the Council from the residents of 
the Coves, in which it was set forth that they did not 
wish to be either in the province of Maryland or Virginia, 
and prayed permission to remain, until the boundary of 
the provinces was determined, on the lands purchased 
from the Indians. 

This proposition was not accepted, and was only fol- 
lowed up by proclamations imposing severe penalties upon 
trespassers. This was deemed absolutely necessary by 
Governor Hamilton, for the French were assuming a 
menacing attitude along the frontier, and it was ne- 
cessary, at all hazards, to preserve the alliance of the 
Indians. 

The Provincial Government was strong enough to drive 
the settlers out of the valley, but immeasurably too weak 
to keep them out. This brought about the treaty at Al- 
bany in 1754, to which we have previously alluded. 
Thomas and Richard Penn, seeing the government unable 
to remove the squatters permanently, in consequence of 



52 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the feelings of the people being with the latter, bought 
from the sachems the very considerable slice of land in 
which was included the Valley of the Juniata, for the 
trifling consideration of £400. This was supj)osed to act 
as a healing balm for the trespasses upon their hunting- 
grounds, and at the same time the Penns undoubtedly 
entertained the idea that they could realize a handsome 
profit in re-selling the lands at an advanced price to those 
who occupied them, as well as to European emigrants con- 
stantly arriving and anxious to j^urchase. 

The Indian chiefs and sachems who were not present 
at this treaty were highly indignant, and pronounced the 
whole transaction a gross fraud; and those who were 
present at the treaty declared they were outwitted by 
misrepresentations, and grossly defrauded. Conrad Weiser, 
the Indian interpreter, in his journal of a conference at 
Aughwick, stated that the dissatisfaction with the pur- 
chase of 1754 was general. The Indians said they did 
not understand the points of the compass, and if the line 
was so run as to include the west branch of Susquehanna, 
they would never agree to it. According to Smith's Laws, 
vol. xxi., p. 120, " the land where the ShaAvnee and Ohio 
Indians lived, and the hunting-grounds of the Delawares, 
the Nanticokes, and the Tutelos, were all included." 

So decided and general was the dissatisfaction of the 
Indians, that, in order to keep what few remained from 
being alienated, the j)roprietors found it necessary to cede 
back to them, at a treaty held in Easton, in October, 1758, 
all the land lying north and west of the Alleghany Moun- 
tains within the province. The restoration, however, 
came too late to effect much good. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 53 

But even the lands west of the Alleghany Mountams 
were not sacred to the Indians, mountainous as they were 
and unfertile as they were deemed; for westward the 
squatter went, gradually encroaching upon the red men's 
last reserve, until he jBnally settled in their midst. These 
aggressions were followed by the usual proclamations from 
the government, but they had little or no effect in pre- 
venting the bold adventurers from crossing the Alleghany 
Mountains and staking out farms in the valley of the 
Conemaugh. This continued for a number of years, until 
the government, wearied by unavailing efforts to keep 
settlers from Indian lands, caused a stringent law to be 
passed by Council in February, 1768, when it was enacted 
" that if any person settled upon the unpurchased lands 
neglected or refused to remove from the same within 
thirty days after they were required so to do by persons 
to be appointed for that purjDose by the governor or by 
his proclamation, or, having so removed, should return to 
such settlement, or the settlement of any other person, 
with or without a family, to remain and settle on such 
lands, or if any person after such notice resided and settled 
on such lands, every such person so neglecting or refusing 
to remove, or returning to settle as aforesaid, or that 
should settle after the requisition or notice aforesaid, 
being legally convicted, was to he jpunished toith death 
iintliout the benefit of clergy. "" 

There is no evidence on record that the provision of 
this act was ever enforced, although it was openly vio- 
lated. It was succeeded by laws a little more lenient, 
making fine and imprisonment the punishment in lieu 
of the death-penalty "without the benefit of clergy." 



64 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Neither does the record say that the coffers of the pro- 
vincial treasury ever became plethoric with the collection 
of fines paid by trespassers. 

During the Indian wars of 1762-63, many of the in- 
habitants of the valley fled to the more densely populated 
districts for safety. Up to this time few forts were built 
for defence, and the settlers dreaded the merciless war- 
fare of the savages. The restoration of peace in the latter 
year brought a considerable degree of repose to the long 
harassed colonies. The turbulent Indians of the Ohio 
buried the hatchet in October, 1764, on the plains of 
Muskingum, which enabled the husbandman to reassume 
his labors and to extend his cultivation and improve- 
ments. The prosperity of Pennsylvania increased rapidly ; 
and those who were compelled by Indian warfare to aban- 
don their settlements rapidly returned to them. The 
Juniata Valley, and especially the lower part of it, gained 
a considerable accession of inhabitants in the shape of 
sturdy tillers of the soil and well-disposed Christian 
people. 

For a time the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians maintained 
rule in religion; but, about 1767, German Lutherans, Irish 
Catholics, and some few Dunkards and other denomina- 
tions, found their way to the valley. Meeting-houses 
were built, stockade forts erected, and communities of 
neighbors formed for mutual protection, without regard to 
religious distinctions. 

The first settlements of the upper portion of the valley 
were not effected until between 1765 and 1770- True, 
there was here and there an isolated family, but the 
danger of being so near the Kittaning Path was deemed 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 55 

too hazardous. It was in the upper part of the valley, 
too, that most of the massacres took place between 1776 
and 1782, as the lower end of it was too thickly populated 
and too well prepared for the marauders to permit them 
to make incursions or commit depredations. 



56 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER III. 

JUNIATA ISLAND — AN INDIAN PARADISE — REV. DAVID BRAINERD 
AMONG THE SAVAGES — THE EARLY SETTLERS, HULINGS, WATTS, 
AND BASKINS — INDIAN BATTLES — REMARKABLE ESCAPE OF MRS. 
HULINGS, ETC. 

Juniata Island — now called Duncan's Island, in con- 
sequence of the Duncan family being the proprietors for 
many years — is formed by the confluence of the Juniata 
and Susquehanna. Stretching northward, it presents a 
lovely and fertile plain, surrounded by gorgeous and 
romantic scenery, surpassed by few places in the State. 
This must have been a very paradise for the sons of the 
forest. Facing to the west, before them lay their beauti- 
ful hunting-grounds; facing to the south, the eye rested 
upon the "long crooked river," over whose rippling bosom 
danced the light bark canoe, and whose waters were filled 
with the choicest of fish. With such blessings within 
their reach, the inhabitants of the Juniata Island should 
have been superlatively happy, and probably would, 
had it not been for the internal feuds which existed 
among the tribes. Although the. wigwams of two distinct 
tribes dotted the island on the arrival of the white man, 
social intercourse and the most friendly terms of intimacy 
existed between them. They were the Shawnees and the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 57 

Conoys. Then, too, it betokened a peaceable spot, and yet 
it had been a famous Indian battle-ground in its day,, 
The traditions speak of a battle fought many years ago, 
between the Delawares and the Cayugas, on this island, 
when the gullies ran red with blood of mighty warriors, 
and the bones of a thousand of them were entombed in 
one common grave upon the battle-field. Both tribes 
sufiered severely. The Delawares, although they lost 
the most braves, and were ultimately driven from the field, 
fought with the most savage desperation ; but the Cayugas 
had the advantage in point of numbers, and some of them 
used fire-arms, then totally unknown to the Delawares. 

The first adventurers who went up the Susquehanna 
were Indian traders, who took up articles for traffic in 
canoes. Fascinated by the beautiful scenery of the 
country, and impressed with the idea that corn and 
fruits grew upon the island spontaneously, these traders 
did not fail to give it a name and reputation ; and curiosity 
soon prompted others to visit the " Big Island," as they 
called it. Some of them soon went so far as to contem- 
plate a settlement upon it. This, however, the Indians 
would not permit ; they were willing to trade at all times 
with them, but the island was a kind of reservation, and 
on no condition would they permit the pale-faces to share 
it with them. Even had they suffered white men to 
settle among them, none would have repented the act, 
as a rash step, more bitterly than the white men them- 
selves ; for the Shawnees were a treacherous nation, and 
exceedingly jealous of any innovations upon their rights 
or the customs of their fathers. 

Still, the island became settled at an early day. The 



58 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

roving Shawnees pushed tlieir way westward, and the 
prejudices of those who took their place were probably 
overcome by presents of guns, ammunition, tobacco, and 
fir&-water. 

The Kev. David Brainerd, a devout and pious mission- 
ary, visited the island in 1745, in the spring while going 
up the river, and in the fall while returning. His object 
was to convert the Indians, which he found quite as hope- 
less a task as did Heckwelder and Loskiel, who preceded 
him with the same object in view. During his jDcregri- 
nations Brainerd kept a journal, which, together with his 
life, was published by the American Tract Society. From 
this journal we extract the following, in order to give his 
views of savage life, as w^ell as an interesting account of 
what he saw and heard at the island : — 

Sept. 20. — Visited the Indians again at Juneauta Island, and 
found them almost universally very busy in making preparations 
for a great sacrifice and dance. Had no opportunity to get them 
together in order to discourse "with them about Christianity, by 
reason of their being so much engaged about their sacrifice. My 
spirits were much sunk with a prospect so very discouraging, and 
specially seeing I had this day no interpreter but a pagan, Avho 
was as much attached to idolatry as any of them, and who could 
neither speak nor understand the language of these Indians ; so 
that I was under the greatest disadvantages imaginable. However, 
I attempted to discourse privately with some of them, but without 
any appearance of success ; notwithstanding, I still tarried with 
them. 

The valuable interpreter was probably a Delaware 
Indian, who was a visitor to take part in the dance and 
sacrifice, while the inhabitants of the island were Shaw- 
nees, who originally came from the south, and their 
languages were entirely dissimilar. Brainerd calls them 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 59 

"pagans" and "idolaters." This is a charge the Indians 
used to combat most vehemently. They most miques- 
tionably had small images carved out of wood to represent 
the Deity; yet they repudiated the idea of worshipping 
the wood, or the wooden image, merely using it as a 
symbol through which to worship the Unseen Spirit. If 
such was the fact, they could not well be called pagans in 
the common acceptation of the term. The journal goes 
on to say : — 

In the evening they met together, nearly one hundred of them, 
and danced around a large fire, having prepared ten fat deer for 
the sacrifice. The fat of the inwards they burnt in the fire while 
they were dancing, which sometimes raised the flame to a prodigious 
height, at the same time yelling and shouting in such a manner 
that they might easily have been heard two miles or more. They 
continued their sacred dance nearly all night ; after which they 
ate the flesh of the sacrifice, and so retired each one to his own 
lodging. 

Making a burnt-offering of the deer-fat to illuminate 
the dance, and to make a meat-offering to the insatiate 
Indian appetite, after undergoing such fatigues, of the 
roasted venison, had not much idolatry in it. Uncon- 
nected with any religious ceremony, such a proceeding 
might have been considered rational, and coming alto- 
gether within the meaning of the Masonic principle which 
recognises "refreshment after labor." Mr. Brainerd con- 
tinues : — 

Lord's-day, Sep. 21. — Spent the day with the Indians on the 
island. As soon as they were well up in the morning, I attempted 
to instruct them, and labored for that purpose to get them together, 
but soon found they had something else to do ; for near noon they 
gathered together all their powaws, or conjurors, and set about 
half a dozen of them playing their juggling tricks and acting their 



60 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

frantic, distracted postures, in order to find out why they vrere 
then so sickly upon the island, numbers of them being at that time 
disordered with a fever and bloody flux. In this exercise they were 
engaged for several hours, making all the wild, ridiculous, and dis- 
tracted motions imaginable ; sometimes singing, sometimes howling, 
sometimes extending their hands to the utmost stretch and spread- 
ing all their fingers : they seemed to push with them as if they de- 
signed to push something away, or at least to keep it off at arm's- 
end ; sometimes stroking their faces with their hands, then spout- 
ing water as fine as mist ; sometimes sitting flat on the earth, then 
bowing down their faces to the ground ; then wringing their sides as 
if in pain and anguish, twisting their faces, turning up their eyes, 
grunting, puffing, &c. 

This looks more like idolatry than sacrificing ten fat 
deer and dancing by the light of their burning fat. Yet, 
if curing disease by powwowing, incantation, or the 
utterance of charms, can be considered idolatry, we are 
not without it even at this late day. "We need not go out 
of the Juniata Valley to find professing Christians who 
believe as much in cures wrought by charms as they do 
in Holy "Writ itself. 

" Their monstrous actions tended to excite ideas of horror, and 
seemed to have something in them, as I thought, peculiarly suited 
to raise the devil, if he could be raised by any thing odd, ridicu- 
lous, and frightful. Some of them, I could observe, were much 
more fervent and devout in the business than others, and seemed 
to chant, whoop, and mutter, with a degree of warmth and vigor as 
if determined to awaken and engage the powers below. I sat at a 
small distance, not more than thirty feet from them, though undis- 
covered, with my Bible in my hand, resolving, if possible, to spoil 
their sport and prevent their receiving any answers from the in- 
fernal world, and there viewed the whole scene. They continued 
their hideous charms and incantations for more than three hours, ' 
until they had all wearied themselves out, although they had in 
that space of time taken several intervals of rest; and at length 
broke up, I apprehend, without receiving any answer at all." 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 61 

Very likely tliey did not; but is it not most singular 
that a man with the reputation for piety and learning that 
Brainerd left behind him should arm himself with a Bible 
to spoil the spirit of the Indians, in case their incantations 
should raise the demon of darkness, which, it would really 
apjDear, he apprehended? In speaking of the Shawnee 
Lidians, or "Shawanose," as they were then called, he 
stigmatizes them as "drunken, vicious, and profane." 
What their profanity consisted of he does not say. Ac- 
cording to all Indian historians, the Indians had nothing 
in their language that represented an oath. Brainerd 
goes on to say of the Shawnees: — 

Their customs, in various other respects, difier from those of 
the other Indians upon this river. They do not bury their dead 
in a common form, but let their flesh consume above the ground, 
in close cribs made for that purpose. At the end of a year, or 
sometimes a longer space of time, they take the bones, when the 
flesh is all consumed, and wash and scrape them, and afterward 
bury them with some ceremony. Their method of charming or 
conjuring over the sick seems somewhat different from that of the 
other Indians, though in substance the same. The whole of it, 
among these and others, perhaps, is an imitation of what seems, by 
Naaman's expression, (2 Kings v. 11,) to have been the custom 
of the ancient heathen. It seems chiefly to consist of their 
"striking their hands over the deceased," repeatedly stroking 
them, "and calling upon their God," except the spurting of water 
like a mist, and some other frantic ceremonies common to the 
other conjurations which I have already mentioned. 

In order to give Mr. Brainerd's impression of their cus- 
toms, as well as an interesting account of a "medicine- 
man" who possessed rather singular religious opinions, 
we shall close with his journal, with another paragraph : — 

When I was in this region in May last, I had an opportunity 
of learning many of the notions and customs of the Indians, as 



62 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

•well as observing many of their practices. I then travelled more 
than one hundred and thirty miles upon the river, above the 
English settlements, and in that journey met with individuals 
of seven or eight distinct tribes, speaking as many diifercnt 
languages. But of all the sights I ever saw among them, or in- 
deed anywhere else, none appeared so frightful or so near akin to 
what is usually imagined of infernal ])oiocrs, none ever excited 
such images of terror in my mind, as the appearance of one who 
was a devout and zealous reformer, or rather restorer of what he 
supposed was the ancient religion of the Indians. He made his 
appearance in his jyontifcal garb, which was a coat of bearskins, 
dried with the hair on, and hanging down to his toes; a pair of 
bear-skin stockings, and a great woodeti face, painted, the one 
half black, the other half tawny, about the color of an Indian's 
skin, with an extravagant mouth, but very much awry; the face 
fastened to a bear-skin cap, which was drawn over his head. He 
advanced toward me with the instrument in his hand which he 
used for music in his idolatrous worship, which was a dry tortoise- 
shell with some corn in it, and the neck of it drawn on to a piece 
of wood, which made a very convenient handle. As he came for- 
ward, he beat his tune with the rattle, and danced with all his 
might, but did not suffer any part of his body, not so much as his 
fingers, to be seen. No one would have imagined, from his ap- 
pearance or actions, that he could have been a human creature, if 
they had not had some intimation of it otherwise. When he came 
near me, I could not but shrink away from him, although it was 
then noonday, and I knew who it was, his appearance and gestures 
were so prodigiously frightful. He had a house consecrated to re- 
ligious uses, with divers images cut upon the several parts of it. 
I went in, and found the ground beaten almost as hard as a rock 
with their frequent dancing upon it. I discoursed with him about 
Christianity. Some of my discourse he seemed to like, but some 
of it he disliked extremely. He told me that God had taught him 
his religion, and that he never would turn from it, but wanted to 
find some who would join heartily with him in it; for the Indians, 
he said, were grown very degenerate and corrupt. He had 
thoughts, he said, of leaving all his friends, and travelling abroad, 
in order to find some who would join with him ; for he believed 
that God had some good people somewhere, who felt as he did. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 63 

He had not always, he said, felt as he now did ; but had formerly 
been like the rest of the Indians, until about four or five years 
before that time. Then, he said, his heart was very much dis- 
tressed, so that he could not live among the Indians, but got away 
into the woods, and lived alone for some months. At length, he 
said, God comforted his heart, and showed him what he should do ; 
and since that time he had known God and tried to serve him, 
and loved all men, be they who they would, so as he never did 
before. He treated me with uncommon courtesy, and seemed to 
be hearty in it. I was told by the Indians that he opposed their 
drinking strong liquor with all his power; and that if at any time 
he could not dissuade them from it by all he could say, he would 
leave them, and go crying into the woods. It was manifest that 
he had a set of religious notions, which he had examined for him- 
self and not taken for granted upon bare tradition ; and he relished 
or disrelished whatever was spoken of a religious nature, as it either 
agreed or disagreed with Ids standard. While I was discoursing, 
he would sometimes say, "Now that I like; so God has taught 
me," &c. ; and some of his sentiments seemed very just. Yet he 
utterly denied the existence of a devil, and declared there was no 
such creature known among the Indians of old times, whose 
religion he supposed he was attempting to revive. He likewise 
told me that departed souls went southward^ and that the difference 
between the good and bad was this : that the former were admitted 
into a beautiful town with spiritual walls, and that the latter would 
forever hover around these walls in vain attempts to get in. He 
seemed to be sincere, honest, and conscientious, in his own way, 
and according to his own religious notions, which was more than 
ever I saw in any other pagan. I perceived that he was looked 
upon and derided among most of the Indians as a precise zealot, 
who made a needless noise about religious matters ; but I must say 
that there was something in his temper and disposition which 
looked more like true religion than any thing I ever observed 
among other heathens. 

If Brainerd was not grossly imposed upon, the Indian 
was a remarkable man, and his code of ethics might be 
used with profit by a great many persons now treading 



64 HISTORY OF THE JUKIATA VALLEY. 

the paths of civilization and refinement. But it is more 
than probable that he had based the groundwork of 
his religion on what he had learned from the Moravian 
missionaries. In the ensuing summer Brainerd again 
ascended the Susquehanna, where he contracted disease 
by exposure, and died in the fall. 

The earliest permanent white settler upon the island 
was a gentleman named Hulings, who located near the 
mouth of the Juniata, over which, in after years, he 
established a ferry; and, after travel increased and the 
traders took their goods up the rivers on pack-horses, he 
built a sort of causeway, or bridge, for the passage of 
horses, at the upper end of the island. He settled on the 
island in 174G. He was followed by another adventurer, 
named Watts, who staked out a small patch of land, with 
the view of farming it. It was already cleared, and he 
purchased it from the Indians. The children of these 
families intermarried, and their descendants to this day 
own the greater portion of the island. A few years after 
the settlement of Watts and Hulings, a gentleman named 
Baskin came from below, and settled near the point of the 
island. He was an enterprising man, and had no sooner 
erected himself a temporary shelter than he established a 
ferry across the Susquehanna. The ferry became profits 
able, and Baskin realized a fortune out of it. It was a 
sort of heirloom in the family for several generations, until 
the State improvements were built, when a bridge was 
erected. Baskin's Ferry was known far and wide; and 
there are still some descendants of the name residing, or 
who did reside a few years ago, where the ferry crossed. 

Shortly after Braddock's defeat, the country was greatly 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 65 

alarmed by rumors that the French and Indians were 
coming down the Susquehanna in great numbers, with the 
avowed intention of slaughtering the British colonists and 
laying waste all their habitations. Nor was this rumor 
without foundation ; for the massacres already committed 
up the Susquehanna seemed fully to justify the apprehen- 
sion. Travel along the river was suspended, and a por- 
tion of the settlers fled to Paxton. Huhngs abandoned 
his ferry, and, with a convoy of friendly Delaware Indians, 
he went to Fort Duquesne, where he immediately pur- 
chased land, with the view of settling permanently. 
There, however, he found little more peace and quiet than 
he enjoyed at the island. The country was rife with 
alarms of Indian depredations, and the settlers were in 
constant dread of an attack which they could not repel. 
Hulings became dissatisfied, because the exchange had 
disappointed all his reasonable expectations, and he de- 
termined to return. To this end he disposed of his land 
for £200 — land which now composes the heart of the city 
of Pittsburg, and could not be purchased for £2,000,000. 
In company with another party of friendly Indians on 
their way to the east, he returned to the island, re-estar 
blished his ferry, built himself a house at the bridge, and 
for some years lived in security. 

About 1761, accounts of Indian depredations above 
again alarmed the lower settlements; but Mr. Hulings 
paid no attention to them, until a large number of them 
were seen but a short distance above the island, encamped 
upon a piece of table-land. In great haste he packed up 
a few of his most valuable articles, and, putting his wife 
and child upon a large black horse, took them to the 

5 



66 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLET. 

Point, SO as to be ready to fly the moment the savages 
made their appearance. At this place there was a half- 
fallen tree, from the branches of which an excellent view 
of his house, as well as of the path beyond it, could be ob- 
tained. Here Hulings watched for some time, hoping that 
if the Indians did come down, and find his house aban- 
doned, they would go up the Juniata. Suddenly it oc- 
curred to Hulings that in his haste he had left some 
valuable keepsakes, and he returned forthwith alone. 
After reconnoitering for som.e time, he entered the house, 
and was somewhat surprised to find an Indian tinkering 
at his gun-lock. The savage was unable to shoot, and, as 
Hulings was a man of powerful frame, he feared to make 
a personal attack upon him. Both appeared to be ready 
to act upon the defensive, but neither was willing to risk 
an attack. 

In the mean time, the reconnoitering and parleying of 
Hulings had taken up so much time that Mrs. Hulings 
became alarmed, and concluded that her husand had been 
murdered. Without a thought of the danger, she took 
her child upon the horse before her, plunged him into the 
Susquehanna, and the noble charger carried them safely to 
the other shore — a distance of nearly a mile, and at a 
time, too, when the river was unusually high ! Such an 
achievement in modern times would make a woman a 
heroine, whose daring would be extolled from one end of 
the land to the other. 

Soon after this extraordinary feat, Mr. Hulings arrived, 
and he, in turn, became alarmed at the absence of his wife ; 
but he soon saw her making a signal on the other side, 
and, immediately unmooring a canoe at the mouth of the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 67 

Juniata, he got into it and paddled it over. It was the 
only canoe in the neighborhood, — an old one left by 
Baskin when he fled. Hulings had scarcely rejoined his 
wife before he saw the flames shooting up from the old 
log ferry-house, and the savages dancing around it, 
brandishing their weapons ; but they were out of harm's 
way, and succeeded in reaching Paxton the same day. 
In a year or so they returned, and ended their days on 
the island. 

Reference is made by historians to a battle fought 
between the whites and Indians on the island in 1760. 
The old inhabitants, too, sjDoke of one, but we could 
ascertain nothing definite on the subject. No mention 
whatever is made of it in the Colonial Records. 

After this period but few of the roving bands or war- 
parties ever came down either the Susquehanna or the 
Juniata as far as the island. The massacre of the 
Conestoga Indians inspired the up-country savages with 
so much terror that they deemed it certain death to go 
near the settlement of the Paxton boys. 

By the time the Revolution commenced, the neighbor- 
hood of the mouth of the Juniata was thickly populated, 
and the inhabitants had within their reach ample means 
of defence ; so that the savages in the employ of the Bri- 
tish prudently confined their operations to the thickly-set- 
tled frontier. 



68 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER IV. 

INDIAN TOWNS ALONG THE JUNIATA — LOST CREEK VALLEY DISCO- 
VERED — MEXICO FIRST SETTLED BY CAPTAIN JAMES PATTERSON IN 
1751 — INDIAN ATTACK UPON SETTLERS AT THE HOUSE OF WILLIAM 
WHITE — MASSACRE OF WHITE — CAPTURE OF A LAD NAMED JOHN 
RIDDLE HIS RELEASE FROM CAPTIVITY, ETC. 

[For the facts on wticla the two chapters following are based we are 
indebted to a gentleman named Andrew Banks, an old resident of Lost 
Creek Valley, Juniata county. He was born near York, and settled near 
his late place of residence in 1773, and was nearly eighty-nine years of 
age when we called upon him early in December, 1855. "We found him 
enjoying the evening of a long and well-spent life, with his sense of hearing 
somewhat impaired, but his intellect and memory both good. He was a 
man of considerable intelligence, and we found him quite willing to give 
all he knew of the past worthy of record. He died about the last of the 
same month.] 

The river, from the island to Newport, is hemmed in 
by mountains ; and while it afforded excellent territory 
for hunting, fishing, and trapping, it held out no induce- 
ments for the Indians to erect their lodges along it. The 
first Indian village above the mouth of the river was 
located on the flat, a short distance above where the town 
of Newport now is. Another was located at the mouth 
of a ravine a little west of Millerstown. At the former 
place the Cahoons, Hiddlestons, and others were settled, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 69 

who were ejected, and had their cabms burnt by Secretary 
Peters. After the purchase of these lands at Albany, in 
1754, both these towns were destroyed, and the Indians 
went to Ohio. 

Lost Creek Valley, unquestionably one of the most 
beautiful valleys in the Juniata region, was entered by 
some Indian traders as early as 1740. They found it oc- 
cupied by two or three Indian settlements, and they made 
a successful barter with the aborigines. The next year 
they essayed to revisit the place, but were unable to find 
it. The following summer they found it again; hence 
arose the name of the lost creek. There is no record of 
any massacres by the Indians in this valley, and the im- 
pression is that they left it about 1754, some going 
toward the frontier, and others to the head of Tuscarora 
Valley. 

The first settlement on the river, in what now consti- 
tutes Juniata county, was made in 1751, by an adventu- 
rous Scotch-Irishman known as Captain James Patterson. 
He came across the country from Cumberland county, ac- 
companied by some five or six others, most of whom settled 
very near to where Mexico now stands. Patterson was a 
bold and fearless man; and he had not long resided in his 
new location before the Indians of the neighborhood both 
hated and feared him. He and his companions cleared the 
land on both sides of the river, built two large log-houses, 
and pierced them with loopholes, so that they might defend 
themselves from any attacks the savages might make. 
Patterson soon became aware of the fact that his reckless 
daring, especially in braving the proclamations of the pro- 
prietors in settling upon unpurchased Indian lands, had 



70 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

inspired the Indians with fear; hence he did not conde- 
scend to make an eflfort to purchase from the Indians, or 
even build a fort for the protection of his little colony. 
In addition to his recklessness, he possessed a good share 
of cunning, that on many occasions served his purpose. 
For instance, he used to keep a target, the centre of which 
was riddled with bullets, leaning against a tree. When- 
ever he found a party of friendly Indians approaching, he 
used to stand under his door and blaze away at the target, 
but always stop when the Indians were near the house. 
The Indians would invariably examine the target, mea- 
sure the distance — about four hundred feet — with the 
eye, and conclude among themselves that Patterson would 
be an exceedingly tough customer in a fight ! His repu- 
tation for shooting obtained for him among the Delawares 
the name of " Big Shot." 

Patterson was a very bold squatter, and staked off for 
himself a large body of land, declaring that Providence 
had designed it for the use of Christian people to raise 
food upon, and not for Indian war-dances. But, with all 
his fancied security and his contemptuous opinion of the 
" cowardly red-skins," they j)ut him to his trumps at last. 
In the year 1755 they no longer visited his settlement on 
the friendly mission of bartering furs and venison for rum 
and tobacco, but they commenced prowling about in small 
parties, painted for war, armed with the rifle — the use of 
which they had already acquired — and exceedingly danger- 
ous-looking knives and tomahawks. Patterson became 
alarmed, and, actuated by a settled conviction that " dis- 
cretion" w^as the better part of valor, himself and his com- 
panions crossed the Tuscarora Mountain and took refuge 



HISTORY OF THE JUKIATA VALLEY. 71 

in Sherman's Valley. A few years after he returned, but 
he found his land parcelled, and occupied by others, who 
held deeds of purchase for it from the proprietory govern- 
ment. Nothing daunted, however, he took possession of 
another piece of land, and commenced cultivating it, with- 
out going through the land-office formula of obtaining a 
legal title for it. He was a man of some intelligence, 
and held in supreme contempt the Penn family and 
their treaties with the Indians. He declared that the 
Albany treaty did not give them a shadow of right to 
the land; and, as it was not considered morallj- wrong 
for the Penns to wheedle the Indians out of millions of 
acres of land for the paltry sum of £400, he did not see 
any wrong in his cheating the Penn family out of a farm. 

For some years peace and quiet reigned in the neighbor- 
hood; but in the spring of 1763 the red man again lifted 
the hatchet, and the settlers were thrown into awe and 
consternation. Constant rumors were afloat of their de- 
predations, and at length a scouting party returned with 
the unwelcome intelligence that a body of Shawnees were 
encamped in Tuscarora Valley. As speedily as possible, 
all the movable effects were placed upon pack-horses, and 
the settlers, by extremely cautious manoeuvering, suc- 
ceeded in escaping safely, and again took up their resi- 
dence in Sherman's Valley. 

The spring having been exceedingly favorable, the 
grain crop was ready to cut early in July, and a party 
was formed by the settlers, and some few others, to go 
back and assist each other in getting in their harvest. 
On their arrival they set vigorously to work; and, no traces 
of savages being perceptible, in their anxiety to get in 



72 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the grain they appeared to forget them, notwithstanding 
each man carried with him his trusty rifle wheresoever 
he went. On Sunday, while resting from their labors, 
some ten or twelve Shawnee Indians approached the 
house of William White, where all the settlers were 
spending the Sabbath. They crawled up to the house 
unperceived, and fired a volley through the open door? 
killing Mr. White and wounding some of his family. The 
wildest consternation seized upon the party Avithin, and, 
in the great confusion which followed, all escaped by the 
back-door except William Riddle. Some swam the river ; 
others escaped in different directions. Riddle did not see 
a son of his, aged about twelve years, escape ; and, with- 
out probably being conscious of what he was doing, 
■walked toward the front-door, wdiere a savage fired at 
him. The muzzle of the gun was so near Riddle's face 
that the discharge literally filled it with gunpowder. 
The ball grazed, but did not injure him. At the moment 
the savage discharged his rifle. Riddle was tripped by 
something upon the floor, and fell. The Indians took it 
for granted that both were killed, and set up a loud shout 
of victory. While holding a consultation about their 
future movements. Riddle jumped wp suddenly and ran. 
Several Indians fired, and for a short distance pursued 
him; but he soon distanced the fleetest runner among 
them. The marauders then returned, and, after scalping 
Mr. White, plundered the house of all the ammunition 
they could find, some few other trifling articles, and then 
set fire to it. 

On taking their departure from the place, from a high 
bluff near the house they discovered Riddle's son, who 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 73 

VSLS trying to conceal himself in a rye-field. They cap- 
tured him and took him along with them. In order to 
give an account of his captivity, we shall be compelled to 
defer an account of the further depredations of the same 
band until the next chapter. 

Some years after peace was restored — the precise year 
not known, but supposed to have been in 1767, — Riddle 
started for the frontier in search of his son. This was a 
time of almost profound peace, which followed the numer- 
ous massacres of the few preceding years, and a time, too, 
when the Indians had been taught some severe lessons, 
and w^ere disposed to act friendly toward the whites. 
Riddle travelled on horseback, and passed numerous 
Indian villages, but could hear no tidings of his son until 
he came upon an encampment of Shawnee Indians near 
Lake Erie. As he neared the village, he saw the warriors 
returning from the chase, and among them a youthful- 
looking brave with an eagle-feather waving on his cap, 
and all the paraphernalia of a young chief decorating his 
person. His bearing erect, his step firm, he trod the path 
with a proud and haughty air. But a single glance suf- 
ficed for Riddle to recognise in the youthful Avarrior his 
son John. Dismounting from his horse, he sprang forward 
and attempted to throw himself into his arms ; but, strange 
to say, his advances ivere reioulsed! Even when the lad 
was convinced that he was Riddle's offspring, he refused 
to go with him, but declared his determination to remain 
with the tribe. 

During the few years that he had been among the sons 
of the forest, he had most thoroughly imbibed their habits 
and a strong love for their wild and romantic life. The 



•74 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

chase, the woods, the council-fires and the wigwams, the 
canoe and the dance of the squaws, were enchantment to 
him, in the enjoyment of which he lost all recollections of 
home or his parents ; and when his father declared that he 
would use a parent's prerogative to force him to accompany 
him, young Riddle, almost frantic with despair, called upon 
his warrior friends to interfere in his behalf. But the In- 
dians, fearful of the consequences that might result from 
any interference of the kind, acknowledged Riddle's right 
to reclaim his son, since the red man and the white man 
had smoked the pipe of peace. It was, therefore, with 
great reluctance that John Riddle prepared to depart im- 
mediately. He took a hasty farewell of his warrior com- 
panions, and, mounting behind his father, they turned their 
faces toward the valley of the Juniata. Mr. Riddle, with 
commendable zeal and a great deal of prudence, put as 
much ground between him and the Shawnee village, before 
nightfall, as possible. He pitched his tent for the night on 
the edge of a thicket, and partook of some provisions which 
he had in his saddle-bag; and, after talking for an hour or 
two, they stretched themselves before the fire to sleep. 
Young Riddle appeared resigned, and had even conversed 
gayly and cheerfully with his father; but the old man had 
his misgivings, and he feared that treachery was hidden 
beneath this semblance of cheerfulness. The consequence 
was that he lay awake for hours; but at length the 
fatigues of the day overcame him, and he sank into a 
deep sleep, from which he did not awake until the sun 
was up, and then only to find that his son had fled ! The 
emotions of a father under such circumstances may be 
imagined, but certainly they cannot well be described. A 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 75 

man of less energy would have given up the object of his 
mission as hopeless, and returned home. 

Not so, however, with Riddle, for he hastened back to 
the Indian village, and asked the Indians sternly for his 
son. Unused or unwilling to dissemble, they frankly told 
him that he was in the council-house, and demanded their 
protection ; that he had eaten, drank, and smoked, Avith the 
red man, and that he was unwilling to acknowledge a pale- 
face as a father or a brother. This highly incensed 
Riddle, and he declared that if his son were not delivered 
up to him, he would bring the forces from the nearest fort 
and exterminate them ; and, further, that, if any injury 
befell him, his friends, who knew his mission, would follow 
and avenge him. A council was immediately called, and 
the subject debated. The young warriors of the village 
were determined that young Riddle should remain among 
them at all hazards; but the counsel of the older chiefs, 
wdio evidently foresaw what would follow, prevailed, and 
young Riddle was again placed in charge of his father. 
The old man, profiting by experience, took his son to a 
frontier fort, and from thence home, reasoning with him 
all the way on the folly of adopting the life of a savage. 

Riddle grew to manhood, and reared a large family in 
Walker township, all of whom many years ago went to 
the West. He is represented by Mr. Banks as having been 
a quiet and inoffensive man, except when he accidentally 
indulged in the too free use of ^^fire-icaterr It was then 
that all the characteristics of the red man manifested 
themselves. "On such occasions his qjq flashed, and 
all liis actions betokened the wily savage." 



76 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER V. 

EARLY SETTLERS AT LICKING CREEK — RELICS OP AN INDIAN BATTLE — 
HOUSE or ROBERT CAMPBELL ATTACKED — JAMES CAMPBELL WOUNDED 
AND TAKEN PRISONER — SCOUT SENT FROM SHERMAN' S CREEK — EN- 
COUNTERED INDIANS AT BUFFALO CREEK — FIVE OF THE SCOUT 
KILLED, ETC. 

The neigliborlioocl of the moutli of Licking Creek was 
settled about 1750. The first settler was Hugh Hardy, 
a Scotch-Irishman, who located about a mile from the 
mouth of the creek. He was followed by families named 
Castner, Wilson, Law, Scott, Grimes, and Sterrit, all 
Scotch-Irish, and the last two traders in Indian goods. 

At the time of their advent at Licking Creek, the In- 
dians were exceedingly friendly, and pointed out to them 
a famous battle-ground near the creek. The oral tradi- 
tion of the battle preserved by them was as follows : — On 
the one side of the creek was a village of the Delawares, 
on the other a village of the Tuscaroras. Both tribes 
lived in harmony — hunted on the same grounds, seated 
themselves around the same council-fires, and smoked in 
common the pipe of peace, and danced the green-corn 
dance together beneath the pale rays of the mellow harvest- 
moon. These amicable relations might have existed for 
years, had not a trivial incident brought about a sad rup- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 77 

ture. Some Indian children at play on the bank of the 
creek commenced quarrelling about a grasshopper. High 
words led to blows. The women of the respective tribes 
took up their children's quarrel, and in turn the wives' 
quarrel was taken up by the men. A bloody and most 
sanguinary battle was the result. The struggle was long 
and fierce, and hundreds of warriors, women, and children, 
fell beneath the deadly tomahawk or by the unerring 
arrow. To this day, relics, such as arrow-heads, pipes, 
and human bones, are found upon the spot where tradition 
says the battle occurred. The "grasshopper war" was 
long held up by the sachems as a terrible warning to 
any tribe about to embroil itself in a bootless war. 

Some historians assert that there was once a fort at the 
mouth of Licking Creek, called Fort Campbell, all traces 
of which are now obliterated. Such was not the case. 
Robert Campbell owned the largest house in the settlement, 
which was pierced with loopholes for defence similar to 
that belonging to Patterson. The settlers had also been 
driven away, and had returned to reap their harvest. On 
the Sabbath referred to in the preceding chapter, while 
the harvesters were gathered in the house of Campbell, 
and immediately after the massacre at Patterson's, the 
same band of Indians stealthily approached the house of 
Campbell and fired a volley at the inmates. Several 
persons were wounded, but there is no authentic record 
of any one being Idlled. 

James Campbell was shot through the wrist, and taken 
prisoner. He was taken to the frontier, probabl}^ to Lake 
Erie, and returned in a year or eighteen months after- 
ward. But the particulars attending his captivity were 



78 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

never published, neither could we find any person who 
knew any thing about the matter further than that he 
was captured, and returned again to his home. 

Immediately after the Indians had discharged their 
rifles, one of them sprang into the house, and with uplifted 
tomahawk approached a bed on which a man named 
George Dodds was resting. Fortunately for Dodds, his 
rifle was within reach, which he immediately grasped and 
fired at the savage, wounding him in the groin. The In- 
dian retreated, and Dodds made his way up-stairs, and 
through an opening in the roof he escaped, went direct to 
Sherman's Valley, and spread the alarm. 

This same band of marauders proceeded up Tuscarora 
Valley, laying waste the country as they went. In the 
dusk of the evening, they came to the house of William 
Anderson. They shot down the old man, who was seated 
by the table with the open Bible upon his lap, and also 
killed and scalped his son and a young woman — an 
adopted daughter of Mr. Anderson. Two brothers named 
Christy, and a man named Graham, neighbors of Mr. An- 
derson, hearing the guns firing, conjectured that the In- 
dians had attacked him; and, their own means of defence 
being inadequate, they fled, and reached Sherman's Valley 
about midnight. Their arrival spread new terror, and a 
volunteer force of twelve men was soon raised to go over 
to the valley to succor the settlers. This force consisted 
of three brothers named Robinson, John Graham, Charles 
Elliot, William and James Christy, Daniel Miller, John 
Elliot, Edward McConnel, William McCallister, and John 
Nicholson. 

Eearing that the savages would murder men engaged 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 79 

in harvesting farther up the valley, they endeavored to 
intercept them by crossing through Bigham's Gap early 
on Monday morning. They had no sooner entered the 
valley than they discovered traces of the enemy. Houses 
were pillaged, and some razed to the ground. At one 
place they had killed four hogs and a number of fowls, 
which they had roasted by a fire, fared sumptuously and 
dined leisurely. At Graham's there were unmistakable 
signs that they had been joined by another party, and 
that the entire force must number at least twenty-five In- 
dians. From their tracks, too, it was evident that they 
had crossed the Tuscarora Mountain by way of Run Gap. 
The dread to encounter such a force would have deterred 
almost any small body of men ; but the Robinsons, who ap- 
peared to be leaders of the party, were bold, resolute back- 
woodsmen, inured to hardship, toil, and danger, and, with- 
out taking time to reflect, or even debate, upon the proba- 
bility of being attacked by the enemy from ambuscade, 
they pushed forward rapidly to overtake the savages. 

At the cross-roads, near Buffalo Creek, the savages fired 
upon the party from an ambuscade of brush, and killed 
five. William Robinson was shot in the abdomen with 
buckshot; still he managed to follow Buffalo Creek for 
half a mile. John Elhot, a mere lad of seventeen, dis- 
charged his rifle at an Indian, and then ran. The Indian 
pursued him, but, fearing the boy would get off, he dropped 
his rifle, and followed with tomahawk alone. Elliot, per- 
ceiving this, threw some powder into his rifle at random, 
inserted a ball in the muzzle, and pushed it in as far as 
he could with his finger; then, suddenly turning around, 
he shot the Indian in the breast. The Indian gave a pro- 



80 HISTOKY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

longed scream, and returned in the direction of his band. 
There is little doubt but that the Indian was killed; but, 
agreeably to their custom, his companions either concealed 
the body or took it with them. 

Elliot went but a short distance before he overtook 
William Robinson, who was weltering in his blood upon 
the ground, and evidently in the agonies of death. He 
begged Elliot to carry him off, as he had a great horror 
of being scalped. Elliot told him it was utterly impos- 
sible for him to lift him off the ground, much less carry 
him. Robinson then said — 

"Take my gun, and save yourself. And if ever you 
have an opportunity to shoot an Indian with it, in tear or 
jyeace, do so, for my sake." 

There is no record of the fact that he obeyed the dying 
injunction of his friend; but he did with the rifle what 
was more glorious than killing ignorant savages; he car- 
ried it for five years in the Continental army, and battled 
with it for tlie freedom of his country. How many of 
his Majesty's red-coats it riddled before the flag of freedom 
floated over the land, is only known to the God of battles. 
The body of Robinson was not found by the Indians. 

During the action Thomas Robinson stood still, shel- 
tered by a tree, until all his companions had fled. He 
fired a third time, in the act of which two or three In- 
dians fired, and a bullet shattered his right arm. He then 
attempted to escape, but was hotly pursued by the In- 
dians, one of whom shot him through the side while in 
the act of stooping to pass a log. He was found scalped 
and most shockingly mutilated. John Graham died while 
sitting upon a log, a short distance from the scene of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 81 

action. Charles Elliot and McConnel escaped, and crossed 
Buffalo Creek, but they were overtaken and shot just as 
they were in the act of ascending the bank. Their bodies 
were found in the creek. 

These bloody murders caused the greatest alarm in the 
neighborhood. The Indians, flushed with success, mani- 
fested no disposition to leave; and the inhabitants of the 
sparsely-settled country fled toward the lower end of Sher- 
man's Valley, leaving all behind them. A party of forty 
men, armed and organized and well-disciplined, marched 
in the direction of the Juniata for the purpose of burying 
the dead and slaying the Indians ; but when they came to 
Buffalo Creek, they were so terrified at the sight of the 
slaughtered whites and probably exaggerated stories of 
the strength of the enemy, that the commander ordered a 
return. He called it prudent to retire ; some of his men 
(^alled it coivardhj. The name of the valiant captain could 
not be ascertained. 

Captain Dunning went up the valley from Carlisle with 
a posse, determined to overtake and punish the savages if 
possible. Before his arrival, however, some five or six 
men conceived the rash idea of giving the Indians battle, 
and attacked them while in a barn. The attack was an 
exceedingly ill-judged affair, for but few Indians were 
wounded, and none killed. They bounded out with great 
fury, and shot the entire party but one, who managed to 
escape. Those who were killed were Alexander Logan 
and his son John, Charles Coyle, and William Hamilton. 
Bartholomew Davis made his escape, and at Logan's house 
overtook Captain Dunning and his command. Judging 
that the Indians would visit Logan's for plunder. Captain 

6 



82 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Dunning ambuscaded his men, and in a very short time 
the savages came, boldly, and entirely unconscious of im- 
pending danger. They were greeted by a volley from 
Dunning's men, and but a short engagement followed. 
Three or four Indians fell at the first fire; and the rest, 
dismayed, fled in consternation toward the mountain, and 
were not pursued. 

Thus it will be perceived that a large number of most 
cruel and cold-blooded murders were committed by these 
marauders linafore they were checked, simply because in 
treachery and cunning the white men could not cope 
with them. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 83 



CHAPTER VI. 

TUSCARORA VALLKY — ITS EARLY SETTLERS — ITS MOUNDS AND ITS 
FORTS — MASSACRES, ETC. 

TuscARORA Path Valley, as it was formerly called, is 
one of the most fertile and beautiful within the Juniata 
range. It embraces an extent of probably thirty miles in 
length, beginning in Franklin county, and ending at the 
river at Perrysville, in Juniata county. The name of 
"■Path" was given to it in consequence of the old 
western Indian path running through it nearly its 
entire length. 

Tuscarora, in its day, must have been a famous place 
for the Indians. Its great natural advantages, and the 
abundance of game it contained, must alone have rendered 
it an attractive place, independent of the fact that it was 
the regular highway between the East and the West, where 
the warrior, the politician, and the loafer, could lie in the 

''Umbrageous grots and caves of cool recess," 

before the wigwam door, and hear from travellers all the 
news astir worthy of their profound attention. 

Tradition, however, speaks of battles among them ; for 
they would fight among themselves, and that, too, with 



84 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

all the relentless fury that characterized their warfare 
with the whites. But of these battles said to be fought 
in the valley the tradition is so vague and unsatisfactory 
that we omit any further mention of them. 

There are two mounds in the valley, — one of them 
near its head, the other some twelve or fourteen miles 
from its mouth, at or near a place, we believe, now called 
Academia. Some persons who examined this mound 
about twenty years ago tried to make it appear that it 
had been enclosed in a fortification, as they averred that 
they had discovered fragments of a wall. This was 
probably a wrong conclusion, as a burial-place would 
not likely be within a fortification. If the mound was 
once enclosed within a wall for protection, it was an act 
that stands without a parallel in Indian history. 

Near the lower mound is an academy ; and during the 
last ten years the students used their leisure hours in 
exhuming the bones and searching for relics, so that by 
this time, probably, but a mere visible trace of it is left. 

The first settlers in Tuscarora were Samuel Bigham, 
Robert Hagg, and James and John Grey, — all Scotch. 
They came from Cumberland county about the year 1749, 
or probably 1750. They were in search of a location for 
permanent settlement. Tlie valley pleased them so well 
that they immediately staked out farms ; and, notwith- 
standing the Indians of the valley treated them with ap- 
parent hospitality, they took the precaution to build 
themselves a fort for defence, which was named Big- 
ham's Fort. By the year 1754 several other persons 
had settled in Tuscarora, among them George Woods and 
a man named Innis. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 85 

Some time in the spring of 1756, John Grey and Innis 
went to Carlisle with pack-horses, for the purpose of pro- 
curing groceries. On their return, while descending the 
mountain, in a very narrow defile. Grey's horse, frightened 
at a bear which crossed the road, became unmanageable 
and threw him off. Innis, anxious to see his wife and 
family, went on; but Grey was detained for nearly two 
hours in righting his pack. As far as his own personal 
safety was concerned, the detention was a providential 
one, for he just reached the fort in time to see the last of 
it consumed. Every person in it had either been mas- 
sacred or taken prisoners by the Indians. He examined 
the charred remains of the bodies inside of the fort, but 
he could find none that he could bring himself to be- 
lieve were those of his family. It subsequently appeared 
that his wife and his only daughter, three years of age, 
George Woods, Innis's wife and three children, and a num- 
ber of others, had been carried into captivity. They 
were taken across the Alleghany to the old Indian town 
of Kittaning, and from thence to Fort Duquesne, where 
they were delivered over to the French. 

Woods was a remarkable man, and Hved to a good old 
age, and figured somewhat extensively afterward in the 
history of both Bedford and Alleghany counties. He took 
his captivity very little to heart, and even went so far as 
to propose marriage to Mrs. Grey while they were both 
prisoners in the fort. 

The French commander, in apportioning out the 
prisoners, gave Woods to an old Indian named John 
Hutson, who removed him to his own wigwam. But 
George proving neither useful nor ornamental to Hutson's 



86 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

establisliment, and as there was no probability of any of 
his friends paying a ransom for him — inasmuch as he had 
neither kith nor kin, — he ojDened negotiations with George 
to let him off. The conditions made and entered into 
between the two were that the aforesaid George Woods 
should give to the aforesaid John Hutson an annuity of 
ten pounds of tobacco, until death should terminate the 
existence of either of the parties named. This contract 
was fulfilled until the massacre of the Bedford scout, when 
Harry Woods, a lieutenant of the scout, and son of George 
Woods, recognised among the most active of the savages 
the son of John Hutson, who used to accompany his father 
to Bedford, where Harry Woods had often seen him. It 
is hardly necessary to add that old Hutson never called 
upon Woods after that for his ransom annuity. 

Woods was a surveyor by profession, and assisted in 
laying out the city of Pittsburg, one of the principal streets 
of which bears his name, or, at least, was named after him, 
notwithstanding it is called "Wood" instead of Woods 
street. 

Mr. Woods, after he removed to Bedford, became a use- 
ful and influential citizen. He followed his profession, 
and most of the original surveys in the upper end of the 
Juniata Valley were made by him. He reared a large 
family, and his descendants are still living. One of his 
daughters was married to Ross, who was once a candidate 
for the office of governor of the State. He lived to a good 
old age, and died amid the deep regrets of a most extended 
circle of acquaintances. 

Mrs. Grey and her daughter were given to some In- 
dians, who took them to Canada. In the ensuing fall 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 87 

John Grey joined Colonel Armstrong's exi)edition against 
Kittaning, in hopes of recapturing, or at least gaining 
some intelligence of, his family. Failing to do this, he 
returned home, broken in health and spirits, made his 
will, and died. The will divided the farm between his 
wife and daughter, in case they returned from captivity. 
If the daughter did not return, a sister was to have her half 

About a year after the fort was burnt, Mrs. Grey, 
through the connivance of some traders, managed to 
escape from bondage, and reached her home in safety, but, 
unfortunately, was compelled to leave her daughter behind 
her. She proved her husband's will and took charge of 
the property. The treaty of 1764 brought a large num- 
ber of captive children to Philadelphia to be recognised 
and claimed by their friends. Mrs. Grey attended, in 
hopes of finding her child; but she was unsuccessful. 
There remained one child unclaimed, about the same age 
as Mrs. Grey's ; and some person, who evidently knew the 
provisions of the will, hinted to her the propriety of 
taking the child to save the property. She did so, and 
in the year 1789, the heirs of the sister, having received 
some information as to the identity of the child, brought 
suit for the land. The trial was a novel one, and 
lasted from 1789 to 1834, a period of forty-five years, 
when it was decided in favor of the heirs and against the 
captive. 

Innis remained among the Indians until the treaty. 
His wife escaped a short time previous. Two of her 
children she recovered in Philadelphia, but a third had 
been drowned by the savages on their Avay to some place 
in Canada. By the exposure it became sick and very 



88 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

weak, and, to rid themselves of any further trouble with 
it, they put it under the ice. When the captive children 
were at Philadelphia, some person had taken one of 
Innis's, and he had considerable difficulty to recover it. 
Had it not been for a private mark by which he proved 
it, the person who had it in charge would probably never 
have surrendered it. 

The Indians of Tuscarora, before the French war, were 
on terms of great intimacy with the whites. They used 
to meet at the fort, and shoot mark, and, w^hen out of lead, 
would go to the mouth of the valley, and return with lead 
ore, almost pure. Lead was a valuable article, and diffi- 
cult to transport; hence the settlers were anxious to dis- 
cover the location of the mine. Many a warrior was 
feasted and liquored until he was blind drunk, under a 
promise of divulging the precise whereabouts of the lead 
mine. Its discovery, if it contained any quantity of ore, 
would have realized any man a speedy fortune in those 
days; but, in spite of Indian promises and the most 
thorough search for years, the lead mines of Tuscarora 
were never found, and probably never will be until it is 
occupied by another race of cunning Indians. 

The fort burnt down in 1756 was rebuilt some four 
years afterward, through the exertions of Ralph Sterrit, 
an old Indian trader. His son William was born in 
Bigham's Fort, and was the first white child born in Tus- 
carora Valley. At the time of burning the first fort, 
Sterrit was absent with his family. 

It is related of Ralph Sterrit, that, one day, while sitting 
outside of the second fort, a wayworn Indian came along, 
who was hungry, thirsty, and fatigued. Sterrit was a 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 89 

humane man, and called the savage in, gave him bread 
and meat, a drink of rum, and some tobacco, and sent him 
on his way rejoicing. 

The circumstance had entirely passed out of Sterrit's 
mind, when, one night in the spring of 1763, Avhen the In- 
dians had again commenced hostilities, the inmates of the 
fort were alarmed by a noise at the gate. Sterrit looked 
out, and by the light of the moon discovered that it was 
an Indian. The alarm was spread, and some of the more 
impetuous were for shooting him down as a spy. Sterrit, 
more cool than the others, demanded of the Indian his 
business. The Indian, in few words, reminded him of the 
circumstance above narrated, and for the hospitality ex- 
tended to him he had come to warn the white man of im- 
pending danger. He said that the Indians were as 
"plenty as pigeons in the woods," and that even then they 
had entered the valley, and, before another moon, would 
be at the fort, carrying with them the firm determination 
to murder, scalp, and burn, all the whites in their path. 
The alarm was sounded, and it was soon determined, in 
consequence of the weakness of the fort, to abandon it. 
Nearly all the settlers of the valley were in it; but the 
number stated by the savage completely overawed them, 
so that they set to work immediately packing upon horses 
their most valuable effects, and long before daylight were 
on their way to Cumberland county. 

The Indians came next night, and, after reconnoitering 
for a long time, approached the fort, which, much to their 
astonishment, they found evacuated. However, to show 
the settlers that they had been there, they burnt down the 
fort, and, on a cleared piece of ground in front of it, they 



90 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

laid across the path a war-club painted red — a declaration 
of war to the death against the w^hites. 

The benevolent act of Sterrit, in relieving the w^ary 
and hungry Indian, was the means of saving the lives of 
eighty persons. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 91 



CHAPTER VII. 

FORT GRANVILLE — OLD INDIAN TOWN — THE EARLY SETTLERS — CAP- 
TAIN JACOBS — ASSAULT ON AND CAPTURE OF THE FORT. 

Preyious to the settlement by the whites, the flat on 
which the eastern part of Lewistown now stands was an 
Indian town of considerable importance. It was the out- 
let of a large and fertile valley, through which ran a north- 
western Indian path, and in which dwelt five or six tribes, 
who found this the natural outlet to the Juniata. The 
council-house stood upon the east side of the creek, near its 
mouth, and the line of wigwams stretched toward the north. 

The first white settlers in this neighborhood came from 
the Conecocheague, by way of Aughwick. They con- 
sisted of Arthur Buchanan and his two sons, and three 
other families, all Scotch-Irish. Buchanan was a man of 
great energy, and very fond of roving in the woods, far 
from the haunts of men. He was the master-spirit of the 
party, and wdth great self-reliance pitched his tent opposite 
the Indian village, on the west bank of the creek. He 
then called upon the Indians, and signified his intention 
to purchase land. They were at first unwilling to sell; 
but Captain Jacobs, (as Buchanan christened the chief, in 
consequence of his close resemblance to a burly German in 
Cumberland county,) who was the head chief, having been 



92 HISTORY OF THE JUKIATA VALLEY. 

liberally plied with liquor, decided that Buchanan should 
have the much-coveted land. What was paid for it 
never transpired, but it is more than probable that the 
remainder of the contents of Buchanan's rum-keg, a few 
trinkets, and some tobacco, made him owner of the soil. 
This was in 1754, 

Captain Jacobs had alwaj^s professed great friendship 
toward the British colonists; but he was among the very 
first won over by the French. He became very much 
dissatisfied with Buchanan, more especially as the latter 
had induced a numl^er of his friends and acquaintances to 
come there and settle. By this means the lands of 
Jacobs were encroached upon, which greatly roused his 
temper; and one day, without deigning to give an exj)la- 
nation of any kind, the Indians destroyed their town and 
left. This was a movement the settlers did not under- 
stand; neither did they like it, for it seemed to forebode 
no good. After a very brief consultation among them, they 
resolved forthwith to build a fort for protection. They 
had for a time noticed a growing coldness on the part of 
Jacobs and his warriors, and, fearful that they might come 
dow^n the valley, joined by other bands, and massacre the 
people. Fort Granville was erected with as much despatch 
as possible. It was located about a mile above Lewistown, 
in order to be near a large spring. Contrary to expecta- 
tions, the Indians did not come, and things generally 
prospered about Fort Granville settlement during the 
summer and winter of 1755. In the spring of 1756 the 
Indians made their appearance in Kishicoquillas Valley, 
in considerable numbers; and parties of roving tribes in 
search of scalps and plunder, emboldened by the success of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 93 

the French and Indians the year previous, sometimes came 
down to the mouth of the creek, but, unable to ascertain 
the power of resistance concentrated "within the fort, they 
never made an attack upon it. These incursions, how- 
e^'er, became so frequent, that in the summer of 1756 the 
settlers only left the fort when necessity demanded it. 
Finally, succor reached them in July. The government 
despatched Lieutenant Armstrong from Cumberland 
county with a militia force to protect them while engaged 
in taking in their harvest, and, directly after his arrival, 
hearing of the exposed condition of the people in Tusca- 
rora, Armstrong sent a portion of his command, with 
Lieutenant Faulkner, in order to guard them while reap- 
ing their grain. 

In the absence of the latter, on or about the 2 2d of 
July, (the Indians having ascertained the strength of the 
garrison,) some sixty or seventy warriors, painted and 
equipped for battle, appeared before the fort and insolently 
challenged the settlers to combat. The commander pre- 
tended to treat the challange with contempt, though in 
truth he was considerably alarmed at the prospect of an 
attack. The Indians fired at one man, and wounded him. 
He happened to be outside, but got into the fort without 
sustaining any serious injury. The Indians divided them- 
selves into small parties and started off in different direc- 
tions. One of these parties killed a man named Baskins, 
a short distance from the river, burnt his house, and carried 
his wife and children into captivity. Another party took 
Hugh Carrol and his family prisoners. 

On the 30th of July, Captain Edward Ward had com- 
mand of Fort ^ranville, with a company regularly en- 



94 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

listed and in the pay of the province. He went, with all 
of his men but twenty-four, to Sherman's Valley, to pro- 
tect the settlers while harvesting. The enemy soon 
ascertained this, and on the first of] August, according to 
the affidavit of John Hogan, then and there taken 
prisoner, (Colonial Records, vol. vii. p. 561,) one hundred 
Indians and fifty Frenchmen made an attack upon the 
fort. They assaulted the works during the entire after- 
noon and part of the night without gaining any advan- 
tage. About midnight the enemy got below the bank of 
the river, and by a deep ravine they approached close 
enough to the fort to set fire to it before they were 
observed. The fire soon spread, and through an aper- 
ture made the Indians shot Lieutenant Armstrong, and 
wounded some two or three others who were endeavor- 
ing to put out the fire. The French commander ordered 
a suspension of hostilities, and offered quarter to all who 
would surrender, on several occasions; but Armstrong 
would not surrender on any condition. He was certainly 
a brave man, and held out nobly almost against hope. 
Peter Walker, who was in the fort at the time and taken 
prisoner, after his escape from Kittaning gave an account 
of the capture of the fort to General John Armstrong. 
He said that "of the enemy not less than one hundred 
and twenty returned, all in health, except one Frenchman, 
shot through the shoulder by Lieutenant Armstrong, a 
little before his death, as the Frenchman was erecting his 
body out of the hollow to throw pine-knots on the fire 
made against the fort; and of this number there were 
about a dozen of French, who had for their interpreter 
one McDowell, a Scotchman." 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 95 

There appears to be a discrepancy between the state- 
ments of Hogan and Walker in regard to the number 
engaged in the assault, but it is quite likely that the 
latter's estimate is correct. 

General Armstrong, in his letter to Robert Hunter 
Morris, goes on to say: — 

This McDowell told Walker they designed very soon to attack 
Fort Shirley with four hundred men. Captain Jacobs said he 
could take any fort that would catch fire, and would make peace 
with the English when they had learned him to make gunpowder. 
McDowell told Walker they had two Indians killed in the engage- 
ment ; but Captains Armstrong and Ward, whom I ordered on 
their march to Fort Shirley to examine every thing at Granville 
and send a list of what remained among the ruins, assure me that 
they found some parts of eight of the enemy burnt, in two different 
places, the joints of them being scarcely separated ; and part of 
their shirts found, through which there were bullet-holes. To se- 
crete these from the prisoners was doubtless the reason why the 
French officer marched our people some distance from the fort be- 
fore he gave orders to burn the barracks, &c. Walker says that 
some of the Germans flagged very much on the second day, and 
that the lieutenant behaved with the greatest bravery to the last, 
despising all the terrors and threats of the enemy Avhercby they 
often urged him to surrender. Though he had been near two days 
without water, but little ammunition left, the fort on fire, and the 
enemy situate within twelve or fourteen yards of the fort, under 
the natural bank, he was as far from yielding as when at first 
attacked. A Frenchman in our service, fearful of being burned 
up, asked leave of the lieutenant to treat with his countrymen in 
the French language. The lieutenant answered, " The first word 
of French you speak in this engagement, I'll blow your brains 
out !" telling his men to hold out bravely, for the flame was falling, 
and he would soon have it extinguished ; but he soon after received 
the fatal ball. Col. Rec, vol. vii. p. 232. 

Directly after Armstrong fell, a man named Turner 



96 HISTORY OF THE JUKIATA VALLEY. 

opened the gates and admitted the enemy. A soldier 
named Brandon, who had been shot through the knee, 
approached the French, told them he was a Roman 
Catholic, and would go with them. His faith, however, 
availed him little ; for, as soon as it was discovered that he 
was not in marching condition, one of the Indians clove 
his skull with a tomahawk. 

The soldiers, who loved their lieutenant, asked per- 
mission to bury him ; but the inhuman French officer 
refused, although they offered to do it in a very few 
minutes where they had raised clay to stay the progress 
of the flames. 

The Indians were under the command of Captain 
Jacobs and Shingas, but the name of the gallant French 
officer has not been preserved. 

The prisoners taken Avere twenty-two soldiers, three 
women, and several children. For fear of being over- 
taken by the provincial forces, they made forced marches 
to Kittaning. When they arrived there, they pitched 
upon Turner to make a terrible example of. In front of 
the council-house they planted a stake painted black, and 
to this they tied him; and, after having heated several 
old gun-barrels red-hot, they danced around him, and, 
every minute or two, seared and burned his flesh. With- 
out knowing but what such might be their own fate, the 
prisoners were compelled to look at the heart-rending 
sight, and listen to the shrieks and groans of the victim, 
without daring to utter a word. After tormenting him 
almost to death, the Indians scalped him, and then held 
up an Indian lad, who ended his sufferings by laying open 
his skull with a hatchet. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 97 

Some of the prisoners made their escape, and others 
were restored to their friends ; but some few of the 
soldiers were never heard of again, having probably 
shared the fate of Turner. 

One of the prisoners, named Girty, returned in a 
wounded condition. When he escaped, he was followed 
by two Indians to the head-waters of Blacklick, where 
they attempted to re-capture him ; but in the fight that 
followed he slew one of the Indians, and the other ran. 
He scalped the one he killed, and took his scalp to Augh- 
wick. The women and children were recovered, by the 
first exchange of prisoners that took place, in 1757. 



98 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER VIIL 

ORGANIZATION OF MIFFLIN COUNTY DISPUTE WITH HUNTINGDON 

COUNTY ABOUT THE BOUNDARY LINE — RIOT IN LEWISTOWN, ETC. 

[Note. — It was not the author's original intention to publish any thing 
of modern occurrence in the Juniata Valle}', but to confine himself exclu- 
sively to its early history ; but several friends in Lewistown made a par- 
ticular request that we should insert an account of the dispute arising 
from the boundary question, and the riot of 1791. The latter has been 
repeatedly published. Still, as it occurred sixty -four years ago, and few, if 
any, living witnesses of the occurrence are to be found, it may be as well 
to preserve the record.] 

Shortly after Mifflin countj was formed, in 1789, an 
attempt was made to run the boundary line, — a proceed- 
ing which gave rise to great excitement and came Yery 
near ending in riot and bloodshed. The bone of conten- 
tion was a strip of disputed territory claimed by both 
Huntingdon and Mifflin counties; and we are under the 
impression that a majority of those residing in the terri- 
tory in dispute fovored the Mifflin county cause. They 
were mostly Irish; and, since the wars were over and no 
enemy to fight, were ever ready, with true Irish Jiosjn- 
tality, to take a brush with their neighbors. Accordingly, 
when the sheriff of Huntingdon came into the disputed 
territory to serve a process upon a man, a party congre- 



'•■'" "V 




HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 99 

gated at an Irish tavern, and, lying in wait for the sheriff, 
arrested and carried him to Lewistown and committed 
him to jaiL He sued out a habeas corpus, and the judge 
discharged him. Filled with wrath, the sheriff went 
home swearing vengeance. He soon summoned a posse 
in Huntingdon, for the avowed purpose of taking his man 
at all hazards, and proceeded to the disputed territory. 
The people, aware of his coming, fired signal guns, and 
soon met in great numbers. The sheriff and his posse 
fortunately took a different route, which alone prevented 
riot and bloodshed. The boundary question was soon after 
settled amicably. 

The riot of 1791, however, was a more serious affair. 
It will be remembered that in those days the military 
spirit in the Juniata Valley ran very high, though we are 
free to acknowledge that it has sadly degenerated since 
then. A gentleman named Bryson had been appointed 
an Associate Judge by the governor. Previous to his 
appointment, he held the office of Brigade Inspector; and, 
in his official capacity, refused to commission two colonels 
elected by their regiments, but in their stead commissioned 
two men of his own selection. This he had a right to do 
under the existing militia law ; nevertheless, the men com- 
posing the regiments looked upon it as a most unwar- 
rantable assumption of power in thus setting at defiance 
the expressed will of the majority, and they resolved that 
Judge Bryson should not enjoy his office. The following 
copy of a letter published, in a paper in York, Pennsylva- 
nia, from the district attorney, is a full histor}^ of the case : 

On Monday, the 12tli of September, 1791, the Hon. W. Brown, 
James Bryson, and James Armstrong, Esquires, met in the fore- 



100 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

noon, in order to open the court and proceed to business ; but 
Thomas Beale, Esq., one of the associate judges, not having ar- 
rived, their lienors waited until three o'clock in the afternoon ; at 
which time he arrived, and was requested to proceed with them 
and the officers of the court to the court-house. He declined 
going, and the procession moved on to the court-house, where the 
judges' commissions were read, the court opened, and the officers 
and the attorneys of the court sworn in, and the court adjourned 
till ten o'clock next morning. 

About nine o'clock, Avhile preparing business to lay before the 
grand-jury, I received information that a large body of men were 
assembled below the Long Narrows, at David Jordan's tavern, on 
the Juniata, and were armed with guns, swords, and pistols, with an 
avowed intention to proceed to Lewistown and seize Judge Bryson 
on the bench, and drag him from his seat, and march him off before 
them, and otherwise ill-treat him. This information was instantly 
communicated to Messrs. Brown, Bryson, and Armstrong, the 
judges, who agreed with me that Samuel Edminton, Esq., the pro- 

thonotary. Judge Beale, Stewart, Esq., Bell, Esq., 

should, Avith George Wilson, Esq., the sheriff of Mifflin county, 
proceed and meet the riotors. And the sheriff was commanded to 
inquire of them their object and intention ; and, if hostile, to order 
them to disperse, and tell them that the court was not alarmed at 
their proceedings. 

Two hours after this the court opened, and a grand-jury was im- 
panelled. A fife was heard playing, and some guns fired, and 
immediately the mob appeared, marching toward the court-house, 
with three men on horseback in front, having the gentlemen that 
had been sent to meet them under guard in the rear ; all of whom, 
on their arrival at Lewistown, they permitted to go at large, except 
the sheriff, whom four of their number kept a guard over. The 
court ordered me, as the representative of the commonwealth, to 
go and meet them, remonstrate against their proceedings, and warn 
them of their danger ; which order w^as obeyed. But all endeavors 
were in vain, the mob crying out, " March on ! march on ! draw 
your sword on him ! ride over him !" I seized the reins of the 

bridle that the principal commander held, viz., Wilson, 

Esq., brother of the sheriff aforesaid, who was well mounted and 
well dressed, with a sword, and, I think, two pistols belted around 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 101 

him ; a cocked-hat, and one or two feathers in it. He said he 
would not desist, but at all events proceed and take Judge Bryson 
off the bench, and march him down to the Narrows, to the judge's 
farm, and make him sign a written paper that he would never sit 
there as a judge again. 

.The mob still crying out, "March on! march on!" he drew his 
sword, and told me he must hurt me unless I would let go the 
reins. The crowd pushed forward and nearly pressed me down ; 
one of them, as I learned afterward, a nephew of Judge Beale, 
presented his pistol at my breast, with a full determination to shoot 
me. I let the reins go, and walked before them until I arrived at the 
stairs on the outside of the court-house, when Judge Armstrong met 
me, and said, "Since nothing else will do, let us defend the stairs." 
We instantly ascended, and Mr. Hamilton, and the gentlemen of 
the bar, and many citizens ; and the rioters, headed by William 
Wilson, Colonel Walker, and Colonel Holt, came forward, and the 
general cry was, "March on, damn you; proceed and take him !" 
Judge Armstrong replied, "You damned rascals, come on; we will 
defend the court and ourselves ; and before you shall take Judge Bry- 
son you shall kill me and many others, which seems to be your inten- 
tion, and which you may do !" At this awful moment, one Holt 
seized Judge Armstrong by the arm with intent to pull him down 
the stairs, but he extricated himself. Holt's brother then got a 
drawn sword and put it into his hands, and damned him to run the 
rascal through ; and Wilson drew his sword on me with great rage, 
and young Beale his sword, and cocked his pistol, and presented 
it. I told them they might kill me, but the judge they could not, 
nor should they take him; and the words "fire away!" shouted 
through the mob. I put my hand on his shoulder, and begged him 
to consider where he was, who I was, and reflect but for a moment. 
I told him to withdraw the men, and appoint any two or three of 
the most respectable of his people to meet me in half an hour and 
try to settle the dispute. He agreed, and with difficulty got them 
away from the court-house. Mr. Hamilton then went with me to 
Mr. Alexander's tavern, and in Wilson and Walker came, and 
also Sterrett ; who I soon discovered to be their chief coun- 
sellor. 

Proposals were made by me that they should return home, offer 
no insult to Judge Bryson or the court, and prefer to the governor 



102 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

a decent petition, stating their grievances, (if they had any,) that 
might be laid before the legislature ; and that, in the mean time, 
the judge should not sit on the bench of this court. They seemed 
agreed, and our mutual honor to be pledged; but Sterrett, who 
pretended not to be concerned, stated that great delay would take 
place, that injuries had been received which demanded instant re- 
dress, and objected to the power of the governor as to certain 
jioints proposed. At this moment young Beale and Holt came up, 
the former with arms, and insisted on Wilson's joining them, and 
broke up the conference. I followed, and on the field, among the 
rioters, told Wilson, " Your object is that Judge Bryson leave the 
bench and not sit on it this court." He and Walker said "Yes." 
"Will you promise to disperse and go home, and offer him no in- 
sult?" He said, "Yes;" and our mutual honor was then pledged 
for the performance of this agreement. 

Mr. Hamilton proceeded to the court, told the judge, and he 
left his seat and retired. I scarce had arrived until the fife began 
to play, and the whole of the rioters came on to the court-house, 
then headed by Wilson. I met them at the foot of the stairs, and 
told them the judge was gone, in pursuance of the agreement, and 
charged them with a breach of the word and forfeiture of honor ; 
and Walker said it w^as so, but he could not prevail on them. 
Wilson said he would have the judge, and attempted going up the 
stairs. I prevented him, and told him he should not, unless he 
took off his military accoutrements. He said he had an address to 
present, and complied with my request, and presented it, signed 
"The People." Young Beale, at the moment I was contending 
with Wilson, cocked and presented his pistol at my breast, and in- 
sisted that Wilson and all of them should go ; but on my offering 
to decide it by combat with him, he declined it ; and by this means 
they went off swearing, and said that they were out-generalled. 

The next day, Colonel MTarland, with his regiment, came down 
and offered to defend the court, and addressed it; the court an- 
swered, and stated that there was no occasion, and thanked him. 

Judge Bryson read a paper, stating the ill-treatment he received, 
and mentioned that no fear of danger prevented him from taking 
and keeping his seat ; but that he understood an engagement had 
been entered into by his friends that he should not, and on that 
account only he was prevented. The court adjourned until two 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 103 

o'clock that day, and were proceeding to open it, -with the sheriff, 
coroner, and constable in front, when they observed that Judge 
Beale Avas at the house of one Con. They halted, and requested 
the sheriff to wait on him and request him to walk with them. He 
returned, and said the judge would not w^alk or sit with Bryson, and 
addressed Judge Bryson Avith warmth, who replied to it in a becom- 
ing manner. The sheriff struck at him, and kicked also. Judge 
Armstrong seized the sheriff, and commanded the peace, and took 
the sheriff's rod from him; the coroner took his place, and the 
sheriff was brought up before the court. I moved he might be 
committed to gaol ; and his mittimus being writen and signed, the 
court ordered the coroner and gaoler to take him, and he sub- 
mitted. The court adjourned. After night the drum beat, and 
Holt collected about seventy men, who repeatedly huzzaed, crying 
out "liberty or death;" and he offered to rescue the sheriff, but 
the sheriff refused. At ten o'clock at night I was informed ex- 
presses were sent down the Narrows, to collect men to rescue the 
sheriff, and Major Edmiston informed me he was sorry for his con- 
duct, and offered to beg the court's pardon and to enter into re- 
cognisance. I communicated this to the Judges Brown and 
Armstrong, and requested they would write to the gaoler to per- 
mit him to come down. They did, and the sheriff came Avith Major 
Edmiston, begged pardon of every member of the court but Judge 
Bryson, Avho was not present, and entered into recognisance to 
appear at next sessions. 

The next day near three hundred Avere assembled beloAV the Nar- 
rows, and I prevailed on some gentlem^en to go doAvn and disperse 
them ; and upon being assured the sheriff AA'as out of gaol, they re- 
turned to their respective homes, and the court have finished all 
business. Nothing further requiring the attendance of the grand- 
jury, the court dismissed them and broke up. I must not omit to 
inform that Judge Beale had declared, during the riot, in court, 
that he Avould not sit on the bench Avith Judge Bryson, and that 
both he and said Stewart appeared to countenance the rioters, 
and are deeply concerned. 

I must now close the narratiA'e with saying that, owing to the 
spirit and firmness of Judge Armstrong and the Avhole of the bar, 
I was enabled to avert the dreadful blow aimed at Judge Bryson, 
and to keep order and subordination in court; and unless the most 



104 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

vigorous measures are exerted soon, it will be impossible ever to 
support tlie laws of the State in that county, or punish those who 
dare transgress. 

The excise law is execrated by the banditti ; and, from every in- 
formation, I expect the collection of the revenne will be opposed. 

I am happy to add, the dispute, which originated by a mistake, 
between Huntingdon and Mifflin counties, is happily closed in the 
most amicable manner, without any prosecution in Mifflin. 
I am, sir, your most obedient, 

John Claek, Dy. St. Attorney. 

To Thomas Smith, Esq., Frcsident of the Court of Mifflin county. 

The following is another account of the affair, and evi- 
dently written by a friend of the offending judge: — 

Carlisle, September 21. 

At a period when the general voice of the people proclaims the 
excellence of the Federal Government, and the State of Penn- 
sylvania in particular is anticipating every blessing from a Con- 
stitution so conformable to it, an alarming sedition, together with a 
most daring turbulent temper, has unhappily manifested itself in 
the county of Mifflin. 

The Governor has lately appointed Samuel Bryson, Esquire, 
second Associate Judge of the Court of Common Pleas of that 
county. This gentleman, having been Lieutenant of the county of 
Mifflin, had excited the determined enmity of two men who were 
ambitious of being colonels of militia, and against the commis- 
sioning of whom (as unfit persons) Mr. Bryson, as County Lieutenant, 
had made representations. Enraged at the promotion of Judge 
Bryson, and unhappily yielding to the impulse of the most unjusti- 
fiable passions, one William Wilson, brother to the sherift" of Mifflin 
county, and one David Walker, levied a considerable force, and 
marched at the head of about forty armed men, with a fife playing, 
to Lewistown, with the avowed determination to seize upon the 
person of Judge Bryson whilst on the bench, drag him from 
thence, oblige him to resign his commission, and compel him to 
march many miles along the rugged Narrows of Juniata River. 

Secresy marked this unexampled treasonable riot. It was not 
known at Lewistown until about an hour before the insurgents 
appeared. Justice Stuart, who had been lately commissioned, and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLEY. 105 

who is a very -worthy man, had been imprisoned in the morning by 
four men who belonged to the party of the rioters. They attempted 
to make him engage his word that he would not give information; 
but he refused. Ignorant of the private movers of this daring and 
turbulent procedure, it was agreed by Judges Brown and Armstrong, 
and other gentlemen, to request the sheriff of the county and 
Judge Beale, who were presumed to have influence over them, to- 
gether with the prothonotary of the county, to represent the ille- 
gality and imprudence of their conduct, and prevail on them if 
possible, to return. No advantage has been derived from this step. 
Mr. Edmiston, the prothonotary, was insulted; the sheriff Avas 
taken into a mock imprisonment; and Judge Beale soon after 
adopted a part which evinced that little real exertion could have 
been expected from him in quieting this disturbance. 

The court was sitting when this armed force, levying war against 
the State, Avith a fife playing, marched resolutely forward. At 
this juncture Judge Bryson asked Judge Beale if it was not likely 
they would stop ; to which the other replied that they never would 
Avhilst such a rascal sat upon the bench. 

Mr. Clark and Mr. Hamilton, two attorneys of the court, at the 
desire of some of the judges, remonstrated with Mr. Wilson, who 
was on horseback and within a few paces of the court-house, at 
the head of the troops, respecting his conduct. Mr. Wilson was 
dressed in a military style, with a cockade in his hat, and was armed 
with a horseman's sword and pistols. He declared his intention was 
to oblige Mr. Bryson to resign his commission and go down the 
Narrows with him and his men. He was warned by the gentlemen 
of the danger of the attempt ; he observed that nothing would divert 
him from his purpose, and immediately drew his sword and marched 
to storm the court-room, where Judge Armstrong and others were 
stationed at the door. The two gentlemen who had addressed 
Wilson ran to the steps in front of the force, where they found a 
number of persons on the stairs. The rioters followed, with a cry 
of "Liberty or Death !" Mr. Armstrong halloed out repeatedly, 
"Villains, come on, but you shall first march over my dead body be- 
fore you enter." This resolution, seconded by the circumstance of 
the gentlemen above mentioned, and a number of other persons, 
keeping their ground on the stairs, (although once or twice some 
called to the rioters to fire,) seemed to stagger the resolution of 



106 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Wilson. At this moment a gentleman proposed to him that if he 
■would disarm, he might have admittance into the court-room. To 
this he seemed immediately to accede. The troops were filed off to 
a short distance. It was then agreed that a meeting should take 
place in half an hour with the leaders of the party. Messrs. Clark 
and Hamilton, with the assent of some members of the court, met 
Messrs. William Wilson, David Walker, and William Sterrett, who 
appeared on behalf of the rioters. Entertaining hopes of preserv- 
ing the person of Mr. Bryson from injury, it was thought prudent 
to promise, if the party would disperse, that Mr. Bryson would not 
sit during that week on the bench. During this conference, Mr. 
Wilson offered no other charge against Mr. Bryson but what re- 
spected the militia commissions for him and Mr. Walker ; but it was 
not until after much discourse that the leaders of the troops could 
be convinced that an extorted resignation would not avail. When 
they saw the futility of this idea, it was long insisted that Mr. 
Bryson should go with them down the Narrows. 

Mr. Wilson, in contravention of the agreement, marched the 
troops to the court-house. In the meantime, Judge Bryson had 
sent for a horse and effected his escape. It was then Mr. William 
Sterrett exclaimed, with an oath, "We are out-generalled !" 

An address was presented by Mr. Wilson to the court, who 
went in unarmed, signed "The People." It was in the hand- 
writing, as is supposed, of Mr. Sterrett. It congratulated the 
other judges upon their appointments, but mentioned and avowed 
their design in coming armed to the court to force the dismissioTi 
of Judge Bryson. Mr. Beale, one of the most activ^e of the 
rioters, armed with a sword and pistols slung aromid him, wished to 
force his way into the court-room, but was prevented by Mr. Clark. 
Four armed men surrounded the person of the sheriff. Under this 
delusive imjorisonment, all intercourse of conversation with him was 
prohibited. In the evening, the rioters departed in a turbulent, 
straggling manner, generally intoxicated. At night, one Corran, 
who had been very active in raising men, was drowned, together 
with his horse, in a mill-dam, about one mile and a half from the 
town. 

About twelve or one o'clock the next day. Judge Bryson re- 
turned. Soon afterward. Col. James McFarland, with about 
seventy militia on horseback, appeared in support of the court and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 107 

tlie laws. At three o'clock, Judges Brown, Bryson, and Arm- 
strong, preceded by the sheriff, prepared to open the court. The 
sheriff was sent Avith a message to Judge Beale, informing him that 
the judges waited for him to join them in proceeding to the com-t- 
house. His reply was that he would not go whilst Mr. Bryson was 
with them. The judges had not walked more than a few paces, 
followed by the attorneys and citizens, when the sheriff, with his 
rod of office in his hand, suddenly stopped, and demanded of Mr. 
Bryson if he had said any thing injurious of him. Mr. Bryson 
made a very moderate reply ; notwithstanding, he was immediately 
assaulted by the sheriff, and received a kick in the same leg which 
had been shattered by a ball at the battle of Germantown. The 
sheriff was immediately taken into custody. The coroner received 
the sheriff's rod, and undertook to go before the judges to court. 
There the sheriff refused to give any recognisance for his appear- 
ance at the next court, and was therefore committed to jail. 

Colonel McFarland presented an address to the judges on behalf 
of himself and the militia under his command, mentioning his ab- 
horrence of the proceedings which had taken place, and offering, at 
the hazard of their lives, to protect the court. To which the fol- 
lowing answer was returned : — 

" The judges of the Court of Common Pleas of the county of 
Mifflin are very sensible of the laudable zeal of Colonel McFarland 
and the militia now under arms, subject to his command, in support 
of the laws and government of Pennsylvania, and particularly for 
the purpose of protecting this court from injury and insult. They 
trust that the daring mob who, being armed, assembled yesterday and 
assaulted the court, threatening the lives of the members, are now 
too conscious of the magnitude of their offence and the spirit of the 
citizens of this county to repeat their attack. Measures are pre- 
paring to vindicate the dignity of our insulted laws, and to bring to 
a just punishment the atrocious offenders and their abettors, who 
have brought disgrace upon the county and trampled upon the most 
sacred rights of the community. The court, therefore, sir, return 
you thanks for the support which you and the militia under your 
command have with so much alacrity brought to the aid of the ad- 
ministration of justice in this county ; but being of opinion that all 
danger from these infatuated men has ceased, we do not think it 
necessary that your attendance should be longer continued." 



108 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

After whicli Judge Bryson, standing at the bar, spoke the fol- 
lowing words : — 

" Fellow-citizens : — It is not my intention to resume my seat on 
the bench during this term. I do not decline it from any appre- 
hension of the mob who yesterday assaulted the court and marked 
me for their vengeance. Supported by my country, by every virtu- 
ous citizen, and a consciousness of my integrity, I have nothing to 
fear ; but understanding that some gentlemen, anxious for my 
personal safety, entered into an engagement with the leaders of the 
banditti that I should not sit as judge during this court, my respect 
for these gentlemen is my sole and only motive for making this 
declaration." 

Colonel McFarland, after this, thanked the militia in the fol- 
lowing terms : — 

" Colonel McFarland returns his thanks to the militia of his 
regiments who now attend in support of the laws of their country. 
He is particularly indebted to Captain Robert Johnston and Cap- 
tain John Brown, for their extraordinary vigilance in collecting the 
men of their respective companies upon a notice given to them so 
late as last night after twelve o'clock. He has no doubt but that 
the same zeal which has distinguished the militia under his com- 
mand upon this occasion will always be as honorably manifested, 
should this county ever be so unhappy as to be disgraced by a 
similar necessity." 

Soon after which, the militia, having been discharged by the 
court, returned home. 

The evening of the day was replete with alarms. One Holt, 
who thought he had cause of complaint respecting a militia com- 
mission, assembled a body of men to the amount of about forty. 
They paraded a considerable time with sound of drum. At 
length, at eight o'clock, they appeared before the prison-door, with 
an intention to break it and enlarge the sheriff. Mr. Sterrett then 
appeared, and informed them that the sheriff thanked his friends 
for their intention to serve him, but this is not a proper period ; or 
words to that effect. 

About nine o'clock, several persons, having long applied to the 
sheriff without success, prevailed on him at length to give a re- 
cognisance to appear at the next court to answer for the assault 
and battery on Judge Bryson. Happily, the sheriff, in this instance, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 109 

relinquished a system which was collecting new horrors and threat- 
ened to involve in new scenes of guilt a number of the inhabit- 
ants. Great numbers in Tuscarora Valley and its vicinity pre- 
pared the following day to march and liberate the sheriff, and 
probably to demolish the court-house and prison. The news of his 
release arrived in time to stop the progress of those infatuated 
men, who appear to have lost sight of the social compact, and 
whose felicity seems to lie in scenes of tumult, disorder, and 
licentiousness. It is to be hoped, however, that government, when 
it comes to enforce the laws, will contemplate the ignorance and 
delusion of these unfortunate men, and that mercy will so far 
temper the prosecution as that it will not be extended to a capital 
charge ; yet it is indispensably necessary that they be taught that 
genuine liberty consists in the power of doing every thing which is 
not prohibited by the laws, and that the exercise of an unbounded 
licentiousness which threatens the dissolution of society itself must 
receive a punishment in some degree commensurate to the greatness 
of the offence. 

How far Mr. Bryson's representations to the governor against 
Messrs. Wilson, Walker, and Holt, have been founded in a just esti- 
mate of the characters of these men, cannot be elucidated here ; 
but it would appear to afford the highest evidence of its propriety 
that they were the principals in this most unexampled riot. 



110 HISTOEY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER IX. 

KISHICOQUILLAS VALLEY — THE SHAWNEE CHIEF KISHICOKELAS — THE 
MINGO CHIEF LOGAN. 

Among the many valleys composing the Juniata Valley, 
or, indeed, among all the fine and productive valleys of the 
State, few, if any, can surpass Kishicoquillas. Its outlet 
is at Lewistown, from whence it stretches west a distance 
of nearly thirty miles, varying in breadth from two to 
four miles. 

After the treat}- of Fort Stanwix, the whites returned 
to the neighborhood of Granville, and some of them com- 
menced exploring the valley. The land was then in- 
cluded in what was termed the new purchase, and Avas in 
the market. The land-office was opened in 1769, and the 
first actual settler in the valley was Judge Brown. 

Old Kishicokelas was a Shawnee chief, on terms of 
friendship with the whites. With the Buchanans he was 
very intimate, and gave them early intimation of the im- 
pending danger, which enabled them to escape. While 
the Delawares and most of his own tribe went over to 
the French in a body, Kishicokelas remained loyal to the 
proprietary government; and, although they made him 
splendid offers at the time they corrupted Jacobs, he re- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. Ill 

jected them all, and declared that no earthly consideration 
could induce him to lift the hatchet against the sons of 
Onas. 

It is to be regretted that historians never made mention 
of Kishicokelas, except incidentally. He was the fast 
friend of the old chief Shickalemy, who resided at Fort 
Augusta, and it is probable that he was converted by 
some of the Moravian missionaries. He died in 1756, as 
appears by a letter directed to his sons, as follows : — 

" Philadeljihia, June 13, 1756. 

"I am obliged to you for your letter by our good friend, John 
Shickcalamy. Your father's letter and present "were received by 
the late Governor Hamilton, who acquainted me with it; and I in- 
tended, at a time when less engaged by public business, to have 
sent you my acknowledgments and answer. 

"I heartily condole with you on the loss of your aged father, 
and mingle my tears with yours, which however I would now have 
you wipe away with the handkerchief herewith sent. 

" As a testimony of love the proprietors and this government 
retain for the family of Kishycoquillas, you will be pleased to 
accept of the present which is delivered to John Shickcalamy for 
your use. 

"May the Great Spirit confer on you health and every other 
blessing. Continue your aflfection for the English and the good 
people of this province, and you will always find them grateful. 
"I am your assured friend, 

"Robert H. Morris." 

Soon after the treaty at Albany, — probably in 1755, — 
settlers, who had heard of the beauty and fertility of Kishi- 
coquillas Valley, flocked thither for the purpose of locating 
lands. Few locations, however, were effected, for the In- 
dians of the valley, with the exception of the chief Kishi- 
cokelas and his immediate followers, were opposed to it, 
and threw every obstacle, short of downright murder, in 



112 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLEY. 

the way of the new-comers. There is no positive evidence 
that any murders w^ere committed in Kishicoquillas at 
that period, but the savages certainly did every thing in 
their power to menace and harass the settlers, in order to 
induce them to relinquish the design of settling upon what 
they still considered their lands. The following letter 
from Colonel Armstrong to Governor Morris gives some 
information of the trials these early settlers were sub- 
jected to: — 

" Carlisle, 3Iay 26, 1755, 
"This day I received a letter from my brother, who is laying out 
lands for the settlers in the new purchase, giving an account of 
three Indians, very much painted, Avho last week robbed and drove 
off several settlers from the Valley of 'Kishicoquillas. One of the 
Indians, by his skulking position, seemed as if he designed secretly 
to have shot, but, the white man discovering him, escaped. They 
took three horses, three or four guns, and some cash. 'Tis said 
they robbed another man up Juniata. 

" To-morrow I am to set out for Kishicoquillas, there to decide 
some controversies, and thence to proceed to Susquehanna, near 
Shamokin, where I expect to meet Conrad Weiser. If he is there, 
he may, by the assistance of the Shickcalamies, be of use in regard 
to those robberies. I am, sir, yours, &c., 

"John Akmstrong." 

Colonel Armstrong did go to Shamokin, where he met 
Shickalemy, and induced him to use his influence in behalf 
of the settlers in the new purchase; but Shickalemy's 
labors were lost, for he could effect nothing among the 
savages of Kishicoquillas, and the settlers were forced to fly 
for protection to Fort Granville ; nor did they or any other 
whites venture into the valley until some time in 1765. 

Shickalemy, or Shickellimus, as he was sometimes 
called, was a Cayuga chief, of the Six Nations, and for 
many years resided at Fort Augusta, on the Susquehanna, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 113 

where Sunbury now stands. He was converted to Chris- 
tianity by the Moravian missionaries about 1742, and was, 
to the day of his death, the firm and steadfast friend of 
the English colonists. To his exertions, in a great 
measure, may be traced the cause why none of the Six 
Nations on the Susquehanna joined the French, and why a 
portion of the Delawares spurned the most tempting offers 
of the French agents and remained loyal to the colonists. 

Shickalemy attended numerous treaties in Philadelphia, 
during which he w^as kindly entertained by James Logan, 
the secretary of the province. The chief esteemed him so 
highly that he named his second son after him, on his 
return from one of these treaties, and immediately had 
him, as well as two other sons, baptized with Christian 
rites by the Moravians. 

In 1755, Shickalemy paid a visit to the old chief Kishi- 
cokelas, for the purpose of adopting some conciliatory 
measures to prevent the Indians of the valley from com- 
mitting depredations upon the settlers. On this occasion 
he was accompanied by his sons, John and James Logan. 
The latter, probably charmed with the beauty of the 
valley, soon after the demise of Kishicokelas settled in 
the valley which bore the name of his father's friend. 
He built himself a cabin (not a wigwam) by the side of a 
fine limestone spring, whose pure waters gushed out of a 
small hill-side in the very heart of the valley, where his 
sole pursuit was hunting. This was Logan, the Mingo 
chief, whose name is perpetuated by counties, towns, town- 
ships, valleys, paths, mountains, and even hotels, and 
which will live in history, probably, to the end of time. 

There is no evidence that he had a family at the time 



114 HISTORY or THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

he resided in Kisliicoquillas; neither was he a chief at 
that time, for he Uved awaj from his tribe, and what little 
intercourse he held with his fellow-men was with the 
whites, to whom he bartered venison and deer-skins for 
such articles as he stood in need of He maintained him- 
self solely by hunting, and was passionately fond of it. 
A gentleman who saw Logan at Standing Stone, in 1771 
or 1772, described him to Mr. Maguire as "a fine-looking, 
muscular fellow, apparently about twenty-eight years of 
age. He weighed about two hundred pounds, had a full 
chest, and prominent and expansive features. His com- 
plexion was not so dark as that of the Juniata Indians, 
and his whole actions showed that he had had some in- 
tercourse with the whites." This noble specimen of the 
red men, unfortunately, had the failing common to his 
kind: he would indulge in intoxicating liquors to excess 
on nearly every occasion that offered. When sober, he 
was dignified and reserved, but frank and honest; when 
intoxicated, he was vain, boastful, and extremely foolish. 
Judge Brown, a short time previous to his death, in the 
course of a conversation with E. P. Maclay, Esq., about 
Logan, said : — 

"The first time I ever saw that spring, (Logan's,) my brother, 
James Reed, and myself, had -wandered out of the valley in search 
of land, and, finding it very good, we were looking about for springs. 
About a mile from this we started a bear, and separated to get a 
shot at him. I was travelling along, looking about on the rising 
ground for the bear, when I came suddenly upon the spring ; and, 
being dry, and more rejoiced to find so fine a spring than to have 
killed a dozen bears, I set my rifle against a bush, and rushed down 
the bank, and laid down to drink. Upon putting my head down, I 
saw reflected in the water, on the opposite side, the shadow of a 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 115 

tall Indian. I sprang to my rifle, -when the Indian gave a yell, 
whether for peace or war I was not just then sufficiently master of 
my faculties to determine ; but upon my seizing my rifle and facing 
him, he knocked up the pan of his gun, threw out the priming, and 
extended his open palm toward me in token of friendship. After 
putting down our guns, we again met at the spring, and shook 
hands. This was Logan — the best specimen of humanity I ever 
met with, either ivliite or red. He could speak a little English, 
and told me there was another white hunter a little way down the 
stream, and offered to guide me to his camp. There I first met 
your father, (Samuel Maclay.) We remained together in the valley 
for a week, looking for springs and selecting lands, and laid the 
foundation of a friendship which never has had the slightest inter- 
ruption. 

" We visited Logan at his camp, at Logan's Spring, and your 
father and he shot at a mark, for a dollar a shot. Logan lost four 
or five rounds, and acknowledged himself beaten. When we were 
about to leave him, he went into his hut and brought out as many 
deer-skins as he had lost dollars, and handed them to Mr. Maclay, 
who refused to take them, alleging that he had been his guest, and 
did not come to rob him ; that the shooting had only been a trial of 
skill, and the bet merely nominal. Logan drew himself up with 
great dignity, and said, ' Me bet to make you shoot your best ; 
me gentleman, and me take your dollar if me beat.' So he was 
obliged to take the skins, or affront our friend, whose nice sense of 
honor would not permit him to receive even a horn of powder in 
return. 

"The next year," said Judge Brown, "I brought my wife up, 
and camped under a big Avalnut-tree on the bank of Tea Creek, 
until I had built a cabin near where the mill now stands, and I have 
lived in the valley ever since. Poor Logan" (and the tears chased 
each other down his cheeks) "soon after went into the Alleghany, 
and I never saw him again." 

Many other characteristic anecdotes are given of Logan, 
the publication of which in tliese pages would answer no 
very desirable end. 

In looking over the few pages of manuscripts left by the 



116 HISTOEY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

late Edward Bell, Esq., we find mention made of "Captain 
Logan, an Indian friendly to the whites." This confirmed 
us in the belief that there were two Logans. "Logan, 
the Mingo chief," left Kishicoquillas Valley in 1771; 
while Captain Logan resided in the upper end of Hun- 
tingdon county at that time, and a few years afterward in 
Logan's Valley, in Blair county. When the Revolution 
broke out, he moved toward the mountain, in the neigh- 
borhood of Chickalacamoose, near what is now Clearfield. 
He served as a sj)y for the settlers, and rendered them 
valuable service. He was an Iroquois or Mingo Indian, 
too, and a chief; whereas Logan, the Mingo, was no chief 
until he removed to Ohio after his relatives Avere mur- 
dered and he took up the hatchet against the whites. 
This explanation is necessary, because many people of 
Huntingdon and Blair counties are under the im^Dression 
that the Captain Logan who resided in Tuckahoe as late 
as 1785, and Louan, the Mins-o chief, were one and the 
same person. 

Logan, in consequence of Kishicoquillas becoming too 
thickly populated, and the game becoming proportionately 
scarce, emigrated to Ohio, where he settled at the mouth 
of Yellow Creek, thirty miles above Wheeling. There he 
was joined by his surviving relatives and some Cayugas 
from Fort Augusta, and a small Indian village of log-huts 
was built up. 

Heckwelder, who must have seen him previous to 
settling at Yellow Creek, speaks of him as follows : — 

About the year 1772, Logan was introduced to me by an Indian 
friend, as son of the late reputable cliief Shikelemus, and as a friend 
to the -white people. In the course of conversation, I thought him 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 117 

a man of superior talents than Indians generally were. The sub- 
ject turning on vice and immoral! tj, he confessed his too great 
share of this, especially his fondness for liquor. He exclaimed 
against the white people for imposing liquors upon the Indians. He 
otherwise admired their ingenuity; spoke of gentlemen, but ob- 
served the Indians unfortunately had but few of these neighbors, 
&c. He spoke of his friendship to the white people, wished always 
to be a neighbor to them, intended to settle on the Ohio, below Big 
Beaver ; was (to the best of my recollection) then encamped at the 
mouth of this river, (Beaver ;) urged me to pay him a visit. I was 
then living at the Moravian toAvn on this river, in the neighborhood 
of Cuskuskee. In April, 1773, while on my passage down the 
Ohio for Muskingum, I called at Logan's settlement, where I re- 
ceived every civility I could expect from such of the family as were 
at home. 

Indian reports concerning Logan, after the death of his family, 
ran to this : that he exerted himself during the Shawnees war 
(then so called) to take all the revenge he could, declaring he had 
lost all confidence in the white people. At the time of the ne- 
gotiation, he declared his reluctance to lay down the hatchet, not 
having (in his opinion) yet taken ample satisfaction ; yet, for the 
sake of the nation, he would do it. His expression, from time to 
time, denoted a deep melancholy. Life, said he, had become a tor- 
ment to him ; he knew no more what pleasure was ; he thought it 
had been better if he had never existed. Report further states 
that he became in some measure delirious ; declared he would kill 
himself; went to Detroit, and, on his way between that place and 
Miami, Avas murdered. In October, 1781, while a prisoner, on my 
way to Detroit, I was shown the spot where this was said to 
have happened. 

That Logan's temper sliould have soured on the murder 
of his relatives and friends, after the friendship he had 
always extended to the whites, is not at all strange. 
These murders changed his nature from a peaceable 
Indian to a most cruel and bloodthirsty savage. Re- 
venge stimulated him to the most daring deeds; and 



118 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

how many innocent white men, women, and children, 
he ushered into eternity to appease his wrath, is only 
known to Him "whose eye seeth all things." 

His people — some say his family, but it never was 
ascertained that he had any — were murdered in May, 
1774. Some roving Indians had committed depredations 
in the neighborhood, and the settlers, highly incensed, 
determined to drive them out of the neighborhood. To 
this end, about thirty men, completely armed, and under 
the command of Daniel Greathouse, without knowing the 
character and disposition of Logan and his friends, made 
a descent upon the village and destroyed it, and killed 
twelve and wounded six or eight of the Indians. Among 
the former was Logan's sister and a son of Kishicokelas. 
Logan was absent, at the time of the occurrence, on a 
hunting expedition. On his return, as soon as he saw 
the extent of the injury done him, he buried the dead, 
eared for the wounded, and, with the remnant of his 
band, went into Ohio, joined the Shawnees, and fought 
during their war against the whites with the most bitter 
and relentless fury. 

In the autumn of 1774, the Indians, getting some very 
rough usage, and fearing that the powerful ariny of Lord 
Dunmore would march upon and exterminate them, sued 
for peace. Lord Dunmore sent a belt of wampum to all 
the principal chiefs, and, among the rest, one to Logan, 
inviting them to a treaty. Logan refused to attend the 
council, but sent the following speech by an interpreter, 
in a belt of wampum. The treaty was held under an 
oak-tree, near Circleville, Ohio, and it was there that the 
eloquent and purely Indian speech which rendered Logan's 



I 

HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 119 

name immortal was read, and brought tears to the eyes of 
many of the sturdy pioneers assembled : — 

"I appeal," says Logan, "to any white man to say if he ever 
entered Logan's cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat ; if he 
came naked and cokl, and I clothed him not. Dm-ing the last long • 
and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate of 
peace. Such was my love for the whites that my countrymen, as 
they passed, said, 'Logan is the friend of the whites.' I had 
thought of living among you, but for the injuries of one man. 
Captain Cressap, last spring, in cold blood, and unprovoked, 
murdered all the relations of Logan, not sparing even my women 
and children. There runs not one drop of my blood in any living 
creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it ; I have 
killed many ; I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, 
I rejoice in the beams of peace. But do not harbor the thought 
that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not 
turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for 
Logan? Not one !" 

The authorship of this speech was attributed to Thomas 
Jefferson, but he most emphatically denied it, as did others 
who were present at the treaty. 

With respect to Captain Cressap, Logan was doubtless 
misinformed. It is true Captain Cressap was a daring 
frontier-man, who considered it an obligation imposed 
upon him by the Creator to slay Indians, but he was 
altogether innocent of the charge made against him by 
Logan. The massacre in question, when the facts were 
known after Dunmore's treaty, was deeply deplored, and 
the wanton butchery of Cressap execrated. Cressap's 
friends, however, would not suffer the stigma of an in- 
human act, of which he was not guilty, to be fixed upon 
him; so they procured all the evidence to be had in the 
case, and fixed the disreputable deed upon Daniel Great- 



120 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

house and his followers. A number of affidavits to that 
effect Avere made bj men who accompanied Greathouse, 
and published a year or two after the treaty ; others in 
1799, when the subject was revived and freely discussed. 
Seeing the great disadvantages the Indians labored 
under in trying to cope -with well-armed and disciplined 
troops, and believing that his revenge was far from being 
satiated, it is quite likely that Logan became partially in- 
sane, as Heckwelder avers; but it is quite certain that he 
became a misanthrope, and for a long time refused to mingle 
with human beings. At length he plunged into deep ex- 
cesses, and all he could earn, by the most skilful use of the 
rifle, went to gratify his inordinate thirst for strong drink. 
The once proud and noble Mingo chief gradually de- 
scended the scale of dignified manhood, outlived his 
greatness, and was killed in a drunken brawl. Sony 
are we to say this, in the face of the romance of history; 
nevertheless it is true. We had the statement from an 
old Ohio pioneer, nearly twenty years ago. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 121 



CHAPTER X. 

COL. JOHN Armstrong's expedition against kittaning — list of 

THE killed and WOUNDED — DELAWARE CHIEFS, CAPTAIN JACOBS 
and SHINGAS. 

The following account of the famous expedition against 
the Indian town of Kittaning we deem worthy of being 
recorded, not only because the companies of Captains 
Potter and Steel belonged to the Juniata Valley, but on 
account of its being an interesting detail of an important 
event in the early settlement of the country. 

The expedition was planned and carried out with great 
secresy, for the sole purpose of punishing the Indians en- 
gaged in the Juniata Valley massacres, and who it was 
known had their head-quarters at Kittaning, where the 
chief instigators of all the mischief, Shingas and Captain 
Jacobs, lived. The command was intrusted to Colonel 
John Armstrong, a brave and prudent officer, and the 
forces consisted of seven companies. He left Fort Shirley 
(Aughwick, Huntingdon county) on the 30th of August, 
1756, and on the 3d of Septeml^er came up with the ad- 
vanced party at " Beaver Dams, a few miles from Franks- 
town, on the north branch of the Juniata." This junction 
of the forces occurred on the flat where Gay sport now 



122 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

stands, where the little army struck the celebrated trail 
known as the Kittaning Path. In his official account of 
the expedition, dated at Fort Littleton, September 14, 
1756, Colonel Armstrong says: — 

We were there [at the Beaver Dams] informed that some of 
our men, having been out upon a scout, had discovered the tracks 
of two Indians about three miles this side of the Alleghany Moun- 
tain and but a few miles from the camp. From the freshness of 
the tracks, their killing of a cub bear, and the marks of their fires, 
it seemed evident they were not twenty-four hours before us, which 
might be looked upon as a particular providence in our favor that 
we were not discovered. Next morning we decamped, and in two 
days came within fifty miles of the Kittaning. It was then ad- 
judged necessary to send some persons to reconnoitre the town, 
and to get the best intelligence they could concerning the situation 
and position of the enemy ; whereupon an officer, with one of the 
pilots and two soldiers, were sent ofi" for that jiurpose. The day 
following we met them on their return, and they informed us that 
the roads Avere entirely clear of the enemy, and that they had the 
greatest reason to believe they were not discovered ; but from the 
rest of the intelligence they gave it appeared they had not been 
nigh enough the town, either to perceive the true situation of it, 
the number of the enemy, or in what way it might most advantage- 
ously be attacked. AVe continued our march, in order to get as 
near the town as possible that night, so as to be able to attack it 
next morning about daylight ; but, to our great dissatisfaction, about 
nine or ten o'clock at night one of our guides came and told us 
that he perceived a fire by the road-side, at which he saw two or 
three Indians, a few perches distant from our front; whereupon, 
with all possible silence, I ordered the rear to retreat about one 
hundred perches, in order to make way for the front, that we might 
consult how we could best proceed without being discovered by the 
enemy. Soon after, the pilot returned a second time, and assured 
us, from the best observations he could make, there were not above 
three or four Indians at the fire, on which it was proposed that Ave 
should immediately surround and cut them off; but this Avas thought 
too hazardous, for, if but one of the enemy had escaped, it would 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 123 

have been the means of discovering the whole design ; and the 
light of the moon, on which depended our advantageously posting 
our men and attacking the town, would not admit of our staying 
until the Indians fell asleep ; on which it was agreed to leave 
Lieutenant Hogg, with twelve men and the person who first dis- 
covered the fire, with orders to watch the enemy, but not to attack 
them, till break of day, and then, if possible, to cut them oif. It 
was also agreed (we believing ourselves to be but about six miles 
from the town) to leave the horses, many of them being tired, with 
what blankets and other baggage we then had, and to take a circuit 
oif the road, which was very rough and incommodious on account 
of the stones and fallen timber, in order to prevent our being heard 
by the enemy at the fire place. This interruption much retarded 
our march, but a still greater loss arose from the ignorance of our 
pilot, Avho neither knew the true situation of the town nor the best 
paths that led thereto ; by which means, after crossing a number 
of hills and valleys, our front reached the river Ohio [Alleghany] 
about one hundred perches below the main body of the town, a 
little before the setting of the moon, to which place, rather than by 
the pilot, we were guided by the beating of the drum and the 
whooping of the warriors at their dance. It then became us to 
make the best use of the remaining moonlight; but, ere Ave were 
aware, an Indian whistled in a very singular manner, about thirty 
perches from our front, in the foot of a corn-field ; upon which we 
immediately sat down, and, after passing silence to the rear, I asked 
one Baker, a soldier, who was our best assistant, whether that was 
not a signal to the warriors of our approach. He answered "No," 
and said it was the manner of a young fellow's calling a squaw 
after he had done his dance, who accordingly kindled a fire, cleaned 
his gun, and shot it off before he went to sleep. All this time we 
were obhged to lie quiet and lurk, till the moon was fairly set. 
Immediately after, a number of fires appeared in different places in 
the corn-field, by which Baker said the Indians lay, the night being 
warm, and that these fires would immediately be out, as they were 
only designed to disperse the gnats. By this time it was break 
of day, and the men, having marched thirty miles, were mostly 
asleep. The time being long, the three companies of the rear were 
not yet brought over the last precipice. For these some proper 
hands were immediately despatched ; and the weary soldiers being 



124 HISTORY OF THE JUKI ATA VALLEY. 

roused to tlieir feet, a proper number, under sundry officers, were 
ordered to take the end of the hill at Avhich we then lay, and march 
along the top of the said hill at least one hundred perches, and so 
much farther (it then being daylight) as would carry them opposite 
the upper part, or at least the body, of the town. For the lower 
part thereof and the corn-field, presuming the warriors were there, 
I kept rather the larger number of men, promising to postpone the 
attack in that part for eighteen or twenty minutes, until the de- 
tachment along the hill should have time to advance to the place 
assigned them — in doing of which they were a little unfortunate. 
The time being elapsed, the attack was begun in the corn-field, 
and the men, with all expedition possible, despatched through the 
several parts thereof, a party being also despatched to the houses, 
which were then discovered by the light of the day. Captain 
Jacobs immediately then gave the war-whoop, and, with sundry 
other Indians, as the English prisoners afterward told, cried the 
white men were at last come, they would then have scalps enough ; 
but, at the same time, ordered their squaws and children to flee to 
the woods. Our men, with great eagerness, passed through and 
fired in the corn-field, where they had several returns from the 
enemy, as they also had from the opposite side of the river. Pre- 
sently after, a brisk fire began among the houses, which from the 
house of Captain Jacobs was returned with a great deal of resolu- 
tion, to which place I immediately repaired, and found that from 
the advantage of the house and portholes sundry of our people 
were wounded and some killed ; and, finding that returning the fire 
upon the house was inefi"ectual, I ordered the contiguous houses to 
be set on fire, which was performed by sundry of the ofiicers and 
soldiers with a great deal of activity, the Indians ahvays firing 
whenever an object presented itself, and seldom missing of wound- 
ing or killing some of our people — from which house, in moving 
about to give the necessary orders and directions, I received a 
wound with a large musket-ball in the shoulders. Sundry persons, 
during the action, were ordered to tell the Indians to surrender 
themselves prisoners, but one of the Indians in particular answered 
and said he was a man, and would not be a prisoner; upon which 
he was told, in Indian, he would be burnt. To this he answered he 
did not care, for he would kill four or five before he died ; and, had 
we not desisted from exposing ourselves, they would have killed a 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 125 

great many more, they having a number of loaded guns by them. 
As the fire began to approach and the smoke grew thick, one of 
the Indian fellows, to show his manhood, began to sing. A squaw 
in the same house, and at the same time, was heard to cry and make 
a noise, but for so doing was severely rebuked by the man ; but by- 
and-by, the fire being too hot for them, two Indian fellows and a 
squaw sprang out and made for the corn-field, who were imme- 
diately shot down by our people then surrounding the houses. It 
Avas thought Captain Jacobs tumbled himself out at a garret or 
cockloft window at which he Avas shot — our prisoners ofiering to be 
qualified to the powder-horn and pouch there taken off him, Avhich 
they say he had lately got from a French oflBcer in exchange for 
Lieutenant Armstrong's boots, which he carried from Fort Gran- 
ville, where the lieutenant was killed. The same prisoners say they 
are perfectly assured of his scalp, as no other Indians there wore 
their hair in the same manner. They also say they know his 
squaw's scalp by a particular hoh, and also know the scalp of a 
young Indian called the King's Son. Before this time, Captain 
Hugh Mercer, who, early in the action, was Avounded in the arm, 
had been taken to the top of a hill above the town, — to Avhom a 
number of the men and some of the officers were gathered, from 
whence they had discovered some Indians pass the river and take 
the hill, with an intention, as they thought, to surround us and cut 
off our retreat, from whom I had sundry pressing messages to leave 
the houses and retreat to the hills, or Ave should all be cut off. But 
to this I Avould by no means consent until all the houses Avere set 
on fire. Though our spreading upon the hills appeared very neces- 
sary, yet did it prevent our researches of the corn-field and riA'er- 
side, by which means sundry scalps were left behind, and doubtless 
some squaws, children, and English prisoners, that otherwise might 
haA'e been got. During the burning of the houses, Avhich Avere 
near thirty in number, we were agreeably entertained with a quick 
succession of charged guns gradually firing ofi" as reached by the 
fire, but much more so with the vast explosion of sundry bags and 
large kegs of gunpowder, wherewith almost every house abounded ; 
the prisoners afterward informing us that the Indians had fre- 
quently said they had a sufficient stock of ammunition for ten 
years' war with the English. With the roof of Captain Jacobs's 
house, Avhen the powder blcAV up, Avas thrown the leg and thigh of 



126 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

an Indian, with a child of three or four years okl, to such a height 
that they appeared as nothing, and fell in an adjoining corn-field. 
There was also a great quantity of goods burnt, which the Indians 
had received in a present but ten days before from the French. 
By this time I had proceeded to the hill, to have my wound tied 
up and the blood stopped, where the prisoners which in the morning 
had come to our people informed me that that very day two 
bateaux of Frenchmen, with a large party of Delaware and 
French Indians, were to join Captain Jacobs at the Kittaning, and 
to set out early the next morning to take Fort Shirley, or, as they 
called it, George Crogan's Fort; and that twenty-four warriors, who 
had lately come to the town, were set out the evening before, for 
what purpose they did not know, — whether to prepare meat, to spy 
the fort, or to make an attack on some of our back inhabitants. 
Soon after, upon a little reflection, we were convinced these warriors 
were all at the fire we had discovered but the night before, and 
began to doubt the fate of Lieutenant Hogg and his party. From 
this intelligence of the prisoners, — our provisions being scafiblded 
some thirty miles back, except what were in the men's haversacks, 
which were left, with the horses and blankets, with Lieutenant Hogg 
and his party, — and having a number of wounded people then on 
hand, by the advice of the officers it was thought imprudent then 
to wait for the cutting down the corn-field, (which was before de- 
signed,) but immediately to collect our wounded and force our 
march back in the best manner we could ; which we did, by collect- 
ing a few Indian horses to carry off our wounded. From the appre- 
hension of being waylaid and surrounded, (especially by some of 
the woodsmen,) it was difiicult to keep the men together, our march, 
for sundry miles, not exceeding two miles an hour ; which appre- 
hensions were heightened by the attempt of a few Indians, wlu>, 
for some time after the march, fired upon each wing and imme- 
diately ran off; from whom we received no other damage but one of 
our men being wounded through both legs. Captain Mercer — being 
wounded, was induced, as Ave have every reason to believe, by some 
of his men, to leave the main body, with his ensign, John Scott, 
and ten or twelve men, they being heard to tell him that we were 
in great danger, and that they could take him into the road a nigh 
way — is probably lost, there being yet no account of him, and the 
most of the men come in. A detachment was sent back to bring 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 127 

him, but could not find him ; and upon the return of the detach- 
ment it was generally reported he was seen, with the above num- 
ber of men, to take a different road. Upon our return to the place 
where the Indian fire had been discovered the night before, we met 
with a sergeant of Cap^in Mercer's company, and two or three 
other of his men, who had deserted us that morning, imme- 
diately after the action at the Kittaning. These men, on run- 
ning away, had met with Lieutenant Hogg, who lay wounded in 
two different parts of his body by the road-side. He there told 
them of the fatal mistake of the pilot, who had assured us there 
Avere but three Indians, at the most, at the fire place ; but when 
he came to attack them that morning, according to orders, he 
found a number considerably superior to his, and believes they 
killed or mortally wounded three of them the first fire, after 
which a warm engagement began, and continued for above an 
hour, when three of his best men were killed and himself twice 
wounded. The residue fleeing off, he was obliged to squat in a 
thicket, where he might have lain securely until the main body 
had come up, if this cowardly sergeant and others that fled with 
him had not taken him away. 

They had marched but a short space when four Indians ap- 
peared, on which these deserters began to flee. The lieutenant 
then, notwithstanding his wounds, as a brave soldier, urged and 
commanded them to stand and fight, which they all refused. The 
Indians pursued, killing one man and wounding the lieutenant a 
third time, through the belly, of which he died in a few hours, 
but, having some time before been put on horseback, rode some miles 
from the place of action. This last attack of the Indians upon 
Lieutenant Hogg and the deserters was by the before-mentioned 
sergeant represented to us quite in a different light, he telling us 
that there was a far larger number of the Indians there than ap- 
peared to them, and that he and the men with him had fought five 
rounds; that he had there seen the lieutenant and sundry others 
killed and scalped, and had also discovered a number of Indians 
throwing themselves before us, and insinuated a great deal of such 
stuff as threw us into much confusion ; so that the ofiicers had a 
great deal to do to keep the men together, but could not prevail 
upon them to collect what horses and other baggage the Indians 
had left after the conquest of Lieutenant Hogg and the party 



128 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

under his command in the morning, except a few of the horses, 
■which some of the bravest of the men were prevailed on to collect ; so 
that from the mistake of the pilot who spied the Indians at the fire, 
and the cowardice of the said sergeant and other deserters, we here 
sustained a considerable loss of our horses and baggage. It is im- 
possible to ascertain the exact number of the enemy killed in the 
action, as some were destroyed by fire, and others in diiferent parts 
of the corn-field; but, upon a moderate computation, it is generally 
believed there cannot be less than thirty or forty killed and mor- 
tally wounded, as much blood was found in sundry parts of the 
corn-field, and Indians seen in several places crawl into the woods 
on hands and feet, — whom the soldiers in pursuit of others then over- 
looked, expecting to find and scalp them afterward, — and also several 
killed and wounded in crossing the river. On beginning our march 
back, we had about a dozen of scalps and eleven English prisoners ; 
but now we find that four or five of the scalps are missing, part 
of which were lost on the road, and part in possession of those 
men who, with Captain Mercer, separated from the main body, with 
whom went also four of the prisoners, the other seven being now 
at this place, where we arrived on Sunday night, not being sepa- 
rated or attacked through our whole march by the enemy, though 
w^e expected it every day. Upon the whole, had our pilots under- 
stood the true situation of the town and the paths leading to it, so 
as to have posted us at a convenient place where the disposition of 
the men and the duty assigned to them could have been performed 
Avith greater advantage, we had, by divine assistance, destroyed a 
much greater number of the enemy, recovered more prisoners, and 
sustained less damage, than what we at present have. But though 
the advantage gained over this our common enemy is far from 
being satisfactory to us, yet we must not despise the smallest de- 
grees of success that God is pleased to give, especially at a time 
of such general calamity, Avhen the attempts of our enemies have 
been so prevalent and successful. I aiu sure there was the greatest 
inclination to do more, had it been in our power, as the officers 
and most of the soldiers, throughout the whole action, exerted 
themselves with as much activity and resolution as could be ex- 
pected. Our prisoners inform us the Indians have for some time 
past talked of fortifying at the Kittaning and other towns. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 129 

The following is a list of the killed and wounded, re- 
turned in Colonel Armstrong's official report of the ex- 
pedition : — 

Lieutenant-Colonel John Armstrong's Company 

Killed — Thomas Power, John M'Cormick. Wounded — 
Lieutenant-Colonel Armstrong, James Caruthers, James 
Strickland, Thomas Foster. 

Captain Hamilton's Company. — Killed — John Kelly. 

Captain Mercer's Company. — Killed — John Baker, 
John McCartney, Patrick Mullen, Cornelius McGinnis, 
Theophilus Thompson, Dennis Kilpatrick, Bryan Carrigan. 
Wounded — Richard Fitzgibbons. Missing — Captain Hugh 
Mercer, Ensigii John Scott, Emanuel Minskey, John 
Taylor, John Francis Phillips, Robert Morrow, Thomas 
Burk, Philip Pendergrass. 

Captain Armstrong's Company. — Killed — Lieutenant 
James Hogg, James Anderson, Holdcraft Stringer, Ed- 
ward Obrians, James Higgins, John Lasson. Wounded — 
William Findley, Robert Robinson, John Ferrol, Thomas 
Camplin, Charles O'Neal. Missing — John Lewis, Wil- 
liam Hunter, William Barker, George Appleby, Anthony 
Grissy, Thomas Swan. 

Captain Ward's Company. — Killed — William Welch. 
Wounded — Ephraim Bratton. Missing — Patrick Myers, 
Lawrence Donnahow, Samuel Chambers. 

Captain Potter's Company. — Wounded — Ensign James 
Potter, Andrew Douglass. 

Captain Steel's Company. — Missing — Terence Can- 
naherry. 

Total killed, 17 j wounded, 13; missing, 19. All the 

9 



130 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

missing, with one or two exceptions, reached their homes, 
and nearly all of the wounded recovered. 

The loss on the part of the colonists was severe, when 
we consider that they had three hundred and fifty men en- 
gaged in the action, while the Indian force did not consist 
of over one hundred warriors. The ignorance of the pilot, 
and the great error of some of the officers in persisting in 
trying to dislodge the enemy from the houses by discharge 
of fire-arms, was no doubt the direct cause of the death 
of many of the brave men ; for all must admit that the ex- 
jDedition was well planned, and admirably carried out, as 
far as circumstances would permit. 

In speaking of the horrible Indian massacres which 
followed the defeat of Braddock, Drake, in his Indian 
history, says : — 

Shingas and Captain Jacobs Avere supposed to have been the 
principal instigators of them, and a reward of seven hundred 
dollars was offered for their heads. It was at this period that 
the dead bodies of some of the murdered and mangled were 
sent from the frontiers to Philadelphia, and hauled about the 
streets, to inflame the people against the Indians, and also against 
the Quakers, to whose mild forbearance was attributed a laxity 
in sending out troops. The mob surrounded the House of As- 
sembly, having placed the dead bodies at its entrance, and de- 
manded immediate succor. At this time, the above reward was 
offered. 

King Shingas, as he was called by the whites, (who 
is noticed in the preceding paragraph,) but whose proper 
name was Shingash, which is interpreted Bog-meadoiv, was 
the greatest Delaware warrior at that time. Heckwelder, 
who knew him personally, says, " Were his war exploits 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 131 

all on record, they would form an interesting document, 
though a shocking one." Conococheague, Big Cove, Sher- 
man's Valley, and other settlements along the frontier, felt 
his strong arm sufficiently to attest that he was a " bloody 
warrior," — cruel his treatment, relentless his fury. His 
person was small, but in point of courage, activity, and 
savage prowess, he was said to have never been exceeded 
by any one. In 1753, when Washington was on his expe- 
dition to fight the French on the Ohio, (Alleghany,) Shin- 
gas had his house at Kittaning. 

King Shingas was at Fort Duquesne when Lieutenant 
Armstrong destroyed Kittaning; but there is no doubt 
whatever that Captain Jacobs fell in the engagement, not- 
withstanding Hans Hamilton, in a letter to the council, 
dated at Fort Lyttleton, April 4, 1756, said, "Indian 
Isaac hath brought in the scalp of Captain Jacobs." 
This Indian Isaac claimed, and we believe received, 
the reward offered for killing and scalping Captain 
Jacobs, and yet Captain Jacobs lived to do a great 
deal of mischief before his scalp fell into the hands 
of the English colonists. 

Not only was Captain Jacobs a great warrior, but 
it would appear that all his family connections were 
Indians of note. In a letter from Colonel Stephen to 
Colonel Armstrong, it is stated, on the authority of a 
returned captive from Muskingum, that 

A son of Captain Jacobs is killed, and a cousin of his, about 
seven foot high, called Young Jacob, at the destroying of Kittan' 
ing, and it is thought a noted warrior by the name of The Sunfish, 
as many of them were killed that we know nothing of. 



132 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

There is no doubt that Armstrong's return did not 
embrace half the actual loss of the enemy, including 
women and children ; but it was a mistake in Stephen or 
his informant to include the warrior Sunfish among the 
slain, for he was a hale old chief in 1781. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. ].33 



CHAPTER XL 

OLD INDIAN TOWN — INDIAN PATHS — AUGHWICK — MURDER OF JOHN 
ARMSTRONG AND PARTY — CAPTAIN JACK, THE WILD HUNTER OP 
THE JUNIATA — GEORGE CROGAN, ETC. 

As we ascend the river, the nearer we approach the 
base of the Alleghany Mountains the fewer places we 
find even mentioned in quite early history. On the fiat 
eight or nine miles west of Lewistown, near a large 
spring, stood an old Shawnee town. It is mentioned 
as early as 1731, in a report of the number of Indians 
accompanying the deposition of some traders. The town 
was called Oliesson, on the "Choniata," and supjDOsed to 
be sixty miles distant from the Susquehanna. As this 
is Indian computation, some allowance must be made, 
for in the same connection we notice the Indian town of 
Assunnejpaclila set down as being distant one hundred 
miles from Ohesson by water and fifty miles by land. 
Assunnepachla was the Indian name of Frankstown ; and 
no person, by following the most sinuous windings of 
the river, can make the distance to Lewistown over 
eighty miles. 

These places were probably never visited by any but 
Indian traders previous to Braddock's defeat, and the 



134 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

consequence is that we are without any record of 
Ohesson, which was evidently destroyed and abandoned 
at an early day. Assunnepachla, however, stood for 
many years, but it lost its name before it became a 
place of importance to the whites. 

Aughwick, it is said, had the honor of receiving the 
first white settlers, in 1749, that came within the present 
limits of Huntingdon county. Of course, they were in 
search of choice lands, and there is reason to believe they 
found them, too, notwithstanding the proprietors and their 
man Peters, in a year thereafter, ousted them by burning 
their cabins over their heads. Aughwick Valley is in the 
extreme southern part of Huntingdon county, and, if not 
a regular continuation of the Tuscarora Valley, is at least 
one of the chain of valleys through whose entire length 
ran the celebrated Indian path from Kittaning to Phila- 
delphia, — the great western highway for footmen and 
pack-horses. 

This path, traces of which can yet be plainly seen in 
various places, and especially in the wilds of the moun- 
tains, must have been a famous road in its day. It 
commenced at Kittaning, on the Alleghany River, and 
crossed the Alleghany Mountains in a southeastern di- 
rection, the descent on the eastern slope being through 
a gorge, the mouth of which is five or six miles west 
of Hollidaysburg, at what is well known as Kittaning 
Point. From this it diverged in a southern direction 
until it led to the flat immediately back of Hollidays- 
burg, from thence east, wound round the gorge back of 
the Presbyterian graveyard, and led into Frank's old 
town. From thence it went through what is now called 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 135 

Scotch Valley, Canoe Valley, and struck the river at 
Water street. From, thence it led to Alexandria, crossed 
the river, and went into Hartsog Valley ; from thence to 
Woodcock Valley; from Woodcock Valley, across the 
Broad top Mountain, into Aughwick; from thence into 
the Tuscarora Valley, and from thence into Sherman's 
Valley, by Sterritt's Gap. 

At Kittaning Point, this path, although it is seldom 
that the foot of any one but an occasional hunter or fisher 
treads it, is still the same path it was when the last dusky 
warrior who visited the Juniata Valley turned his face to 
the west, and traversed it for the last time. True, it is 
filled up with weeds in summer-time, but the indentation 
made by the feet of thousands upon thousands of warriors 
and pack-horses which travelled it for an unknown number 
of years are still plainly visible. We have gone up the 
Kittaning gorge two or three miles, repeatedly, and looked 
upon the ruins of old huts, and the road, which evidently 
never received the impression of a wagon-wheel, and were 
forcibly struck with the idea that it must once have been 
traversed, without knowing at the time that it was the 
famous Kittaning trail. In some places, where the ground 
was marshy, close to the run, the path is at least twelve 
inches deejD, and the very stones along the road bear the 
marks of the iron-shod horses of the Indian traders. Two 
years ago, we picked up, at the edge of the run, a mile up 
the gorge, two gun-flints, — now rated as relics of a past 
age. At the time we supposed that some modern Nimrod 
lost them. Now, however, we incline to the belief that 
they fell from the pocket of some weary soldier in Arm- 
strong's battalion, who lay down upon the bank of the 



loG HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

brook to slake his thirst, nearly a hundred years ago. 
The j)ath can be traced in various other places, but no- 
where so plain as in the Kittaning gorge. This is owing 
to the fact that one or two other paths led into it, and no 
improvement has been made in the gorge east of "Harts 
Sleeping Place," along the line of the path. 

Anghwick was an Indian town, located probably near 
where Shirleysburg now stands, and for a long time was 
an important frontier post. The name of the j)lace figures 
extensively in the Colonial Records, first as a place where 
many conferences were held, and afterward as Fort 
Shirley. 

Previous to actual settlers coming into the Juniata 
Valley, every inch of it was known to the traders — or, at 
least, every Indian town in it; and how long they traf- 
ficked with the red men before actual settlers came is 
unknown. Thus, for instance, six or seven years before 
the settlement of Anghwick, a trader named John Arm- 
strong, and his two servant-men, were murdered at what 
is now Jack's Narrows, in Huntingdon countv. As there 
are several narrows along the Juniata, we should have 
been at a loss to locate the scene of the murder, had we 
not accidentally noticed in the Archives a calculation 
of distances by John Harris, wherein he says — " From 
Anghwick to Jack Armstrong's Narrows — so called from 
his being there murdered, — eight miles." At the time of 
the massacre, the British colonists and the Indians were 
on the most friendly terms of intimacy, and Armstrong 
was a man of some standing and influence, so that the mur- 
der (the first one of so atrocious a nature in that region) 
created the most intense excitement. Along with Arm- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 137 

strong, his servant-men, James Smith and Woodward Ar- 
nold, were also murdered. The charge was laid to a Dela- 
ware Indian, named Musemeelin, and two companions. 
Seven white men and five Indians searched for the bodies, 
found and buried them. The Indian was arrested and 
taken to Lancaster, and from there removed to Phila- 
delphia for trial, but whether convicted or not the record 
does not say. Allumoppies, King of the Delawares, 
Shickallemy, and a number of other Indians of standing 
and influence, were brought before the council in Phila- 
delphia, when the friends of Armstrong produced the fol- 
lowing affidavit of those who searched for the bodies : — 

Paxton, April 19, 1744. 
The deposition of the subscribers testifieth and saith, that the 
subscribers, having a suspicion that John Armstrong, trader, to- 
gether "with his men, James Smith and Woodward Arnokl, were 
murdered by the Indians, they met at the house of Joseph 
Chambers, in Paxton, and there consulted to go to Shamokin, to 
consult with the Delaware king and Shickcalimy, and there council 
what they should do concerning the affair. Whereupon the king 
and council ordered eight of their men to go with the deponents 
to the house of James Berry, in order to go in quest of the mur- 
dered persons ; but that night they came to the said Berry's 
house three of the eight Indians ran away; and the next morning 
these deponents, with the five Indians that remained, set out on 
their journey, peaceably, to the last supposed sleeping-place of the 
deceased ; and upon their arrival, these deponents dispersed them- 
selves, in order to find out the corpse of the deceased; and one 
of the deponents, named James Berry, a small distance from the 
aforesaid sleeping-place, came to a white-oak tree, which had three 
notches on it, and close by said tree he found a shoulder-bone, 
which the deponent does suppose to be John Armstrong's, — and 
that he himself was eaten by the Indians, — which he carried to the 
aforesaid sleeping-place, and showed it to his companions, one of 
whom handed it to the said five Indians to know what bone it was ; 



138 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

and thej, after passing different sentiments upon it, handed it to a 
Delaware Indian, who was suspected by the deponents; and they tes- 
tify and say that as soon as the Indian took the bone in his hand 
his nose gushed out with blood, and he directly handed it to another. 
From whence these deponents steered along a path, about three or 
four miles, to the Narrows of Juniata, where they suspected the 
murder to have been committed ; and where the Alleghany Road 
crosses the creek these deponents sat down, in order to consult on 
what measures to take to proceed on a discovery. Whereupon 
most of the white men, these deponents, crossed the creek again, 
and went down the creek, and crossed into an island, where these 
deponents had intelligence the corpse had been thrown ; and there 
they met the rest of the white men and Indians who were in com- 
pany, and there consulted to go farther down the creek in quest 
of the corpse. And these deponents further say, they ordered the 
Indians to go down the creek on the other side ; but they all fol- 
lowed these deponents at a small distance, except one Indian, who 
crossed the creek again ; and soon after these deponents, seeing 
some bald eagles and other fowls, suspected the corpse to be there- 
abouts, and then lost sight of the Indians, and immediately found 
one of the corpses, which these deponents say was the corpse of 
James Smith, one of said Armstrong's men ; and directly upon 
finding the corpse these deponents heard three shots of guns, 
which they had great reason to think were the Indians their com- 
panions, who had deserted from them ; and in order to let them 
know that they had found the corpse these deponents fired three 
guns, but to no purpose, for they never saw the Indians any more. 
And about a quarter of a mile down the creek they saw more bald 
eagles, whereupon they made down toward the place, where they 
found another corpse (being the corpse of Woodworth Arnold, the 
■other servant of said Armstrong) lying on a rock, and then went 
to the former sleeping-place, where they had appointed to meet 
the Indians ; but saw no Indians, only that the Indians had been 
there, and cooked some victuals for themselves and had gone off. 

And that night, the deponents further say, they had great reason 
to suspect that the Indians were then thereabouts, and intended to 
■do them some damage ; for a dog these deponents had Avith them 
barked that night, which was remarkable, for the said dog had not 
barked all the time they were out till that night, nor ever since, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 139 

which occasioned these deponents to stand upon their guard behind 
the trees, with their guns cocked, that night. Next morning these 
deponents went back to the corpses, which they found to be bar- 
barously and inhumanly murdered by very gashed, deep cuts on 
their hands with a tomahawk, or such like weapon, which had 
sunk into their skulls and brains ; and in one of the corpses there 
appeared a hole in his skull near the cut, which was supposed to 
be with a tomahawk, which hole these deponents do believe to be a 
bullet-hole. And these deponents, after taking as particular view 
of the corpses as their melancholy condition would admit, they 
buried them as decently as their circumstances would allow, and 
returned home to Paxton, — the Alleghany Road to John Harris's, 
thinking it dangerous to return the same way they went. And 
further these deponents say not. 

These same deponents, being legally qualified before me, James 
Armstrong, one of his majesty's justices of the peace for the 
county of Lancaster, have hereunto set their hands in testimony 
thereof. 

James Armstrong. 

Alexander Armstrong, Thomas McKee, Francis Ellis, John 
Florster, William Baskins, James Berry, John Watt, James Arm- 
strong, David Denny. 

After the foregoing facts had been elicited, a regular 
Indian talk was had upon the matter, when Shickallemy 
gave the following as a true version of every thing con- 
nected with the massacre : — 

Brother the Governor: — 

We have been all misinformed on both sides about the unhappy 
accident. Musemeelin has certainly murdered the three white men 
himself, and, upon the bare accusation of Neshaleeny's son, was 
seized and made a prisoner. Our cousins, the Delaware Indians, 
being then drunk, in particular Allumoppies, never examined 
things, but made an innocent person prisoner, which gave a great 
deal of disturbance among us. However, the two prisoners were 
sent, and by the way, in going down the river, they stopped at the 
house of James Berry. James told the young man, "I am sorry 



140 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

to see you in such a conflition ; I have known you from a boy, and 
always loved you." Then the young man seemed to be very much 
struck to the heart, and said, "I have said nothing yet, but I will 
tell all ; let all the Indians come up, and the white people also ; 
they shall hear it;" and then told Muscmeelin, in the presence 
of the people, "Now I am going to die for your wickedness; you 
have killed all the three white men. I never did intend to kill any 
of them." Then Musemeelin, in anger, said, " It is true, I have killed 
them. I am a man, you are a coward. It is a great satisfaction to 
me to have killed them ; I will die for joy for having killed a great 
rogue and his companions." Upon which the young man was set at 
liberty by the Indians. 

We desire therefore our brother the governor will not insist to 
have either of the two young men in prison or condemned to die ; 
it is not with Indians as with white people, to put people in prison 
on suspicion or trifles. Indians must first be found guilty of a 
cause; then judgment is given and immediately executed. We will 
give you faithfully all the particulars, and at the ensuing treaty 
entirely satisfy you ; in the mean time, we desire that good friend- 
ship and harmony continue, and that we may live long together 
is the hearty desire of ^'^our brethren the Indians of the United 
Six Nations present at Shamokin. 

The following is what Shickcalamy declared to be the truth of 
the story concerning the murder of John Armstrong, Woodworth 
Arnold, and James Smith, from the beginning to the end, to wit: — 

That Musemeelin owing some skins to John Armstrong, the said 
Armstrong seized a horse of the said Musemeelin and a rifle-gun ; 
the gun was taken by James Smith, deceased. Some time last 
W'inter Musemeelin met Armstrong on the river Juniata, and paid 
all but twenty shillings, for which he offered a neck-belt in pawn 
to Armstrong, and demanded his horse, and James Armstrong re- 
fused it, and would not deliver up the horse, but enlarged the debt, 
as his usual custom was ; and after some quarrel the Indian went 
away in great anger, Avithout his horse, to his hunting-cabin. 
Some time after this, Armstrong, with his two companions, on their 
Avay to Ohio, passed by the said Musemeelin's hunting-cabin ; his 
wife only being at home, she demanded the horse of Armstrong, 
because he was her proper goods, but did not get him. Armstrong 
had by this time sold or lent the horse to James Berry. After 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 141 

Musemeelin came from hunting, Lis wife told him that Armstrong 
was gone by, and that she had demanded the horse of him, but did 
not get him ; and, as is thought, pressed him to pursue and take 
revenge of Armstrong. The third day, in the morning, after James 
Armstrong was gone by, Musemeelin said to the two young men 
that hunted with him, " Come, let us go toward the Great Hills to 
hunt bears;" accordingly they went all three in company. After 
they had gone a good way, Musemeelin, who was foremost, was 
told by the two young men that they were out of their course. 
" Come you along," said Musemeelin ; and they accordingly followed 
him till they came to the path that leads to the Ohio. Then 
Musemeelin told them he had a good mind to go and fetch his 
horse back from Armstrong, and desired the two young men to 
come along. Accordingly they went. It was then almost night, 
and they travelled till next morning. Musemeelin said, "Now they 
are not far oif. We will make ourselves black ; then they will be 
frightened, and will deliver up the horse immediately ; and I will tell 
Jack that if he don't give me the horse I will kill him;" and when 
he said so, he laughed. The young men thought he joked, as he 
used to do. They did not blacken themselves, but he did. When 
the sun was above the trees, or about an hour high, they all came 
to the fire, where they found James Smith sitting ; and they also 
sat down. Musemeelin asked where Jack was. Smith told him 
that he was gone to clear the road a little. Musemeelin said he 
wanted to speak with him, and went that way, and after he had 
gone a little distance from the fire, he said something, and looked 
back laughing, but, he having a thick throat, and his speech being 
very bad, and their talking with Smith hindering them from un- 
derstanding what he said, they did not mind it. They being 
hungry. Smith told them to kill some turtles, of which there were 
plenty, and they would make some bread by-and-by, and would 
all eat together. While they were talking, they heard a gun go 
off not far ofl", at which time Woodworth Arnold was killed, as they 
learned afterward. Soon after, Musemeelin came back and said, 
" Why did you not kill that white man, according as I bid you? I 
have laid the other two down." At this they were surprised; and 
one of the young men, commonly called Jimmy, ran away to the 
river-side. Musemeelin said to the other, " How Avill you do to kill 
Catawbas, if you cannot kill white men ? You cowards ! I'll show 



142 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

you how you must do;" and then, taking up the English axe that 
lay there, he struck it three times into Smith's head before he died. 
Smith never stirred. Then he told the young Indian to call the 
other, but he was so terrified he could not call. Musemeelin then 
went and fetched him, and said that two of the white men were 
killed, he must now go and kill the third ; then each of them would 
have killed one. But neither of them dared venture to talk any 
thing about it. Then he pressed them to go along with him ; he 
went foremost. Then one of the young men told the other, as they 
went along, " My friend, don't you kill any of the white people, let 
him do what he will ; I have not killed Smith ; he has done it himself; 
we have no need to do such a barbarous thing." Musemeelin being 
then a good way before them, in a hurry, they soon saw John 
Armstrong sitting upon an old log. Musemeelin spoke to him and 
said, "Where is my horse ?" Armstrong made answer and said, " He 
will come by-and-by ; you shall have him." " I want him now," said 
Musemeelin. Armstrong answered, " You shall have him. Come, 
let us go to that fire," (which was at some distance from the place 
where Armstrong sat,) " and let us talk and smoke together." " Go 
along, then," said Musemeelin. " I am coming," said Armstrong, 
" do you go before, Musemeelin ; do you go foremost." Armstrong 
looked then like a dead man, and went toward the fire, and was 
immediately shot in his back by Musemeelin, and fell. Musemeelin 
then took his hatchet and struck it into Armstrong's head, and 
said, " Give me my horse, I tell you." By this time one of the young 
men had fled again that had gone away before, but he returned in 
a short time. Musemeelin then told the young men they must not 
offer to discover or tell a word about what had been done, for their 
lives ; but they must help him to bury Jack, and the other two were 
to be thrown into the river. After that was done, Musemeelin 
ordered them to load the horses and follow toward the hill, where 
they intended to hide the goods. Accordingly they did ; and, as they 
were going, Musemeelin told them that, as there Avere a great many 
Indians hunting about that place, if they should happen to meet 
with any they must be killed to prevent betraying them. As they 
went along, Musemeelin going before, the two young men agreed 
to run away as soon as they could meet with any Indians, and not 
to hurt anybody. They came to the desired place ; the horses 
were unloaded, and Musemeelin opened the bundles, and oifered 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 143 

the two young men each a parcel of goods. They told him that as 
they had already sold their skins, and everybody knew they had 
nothing, they would certainly be charged with a black action were 
they to bring any goods to the town, and therefore would not ac- 
cept of any, but promised nevertheless not to betray him. "Now," 
says Musemeelin, " I know what you were talking about when you 
stayed so far behind." 

The two young men being in great danger of losing their lives 
— of which they had been much afraid all that day — accepted of 
what he offered to them, and the rest of the goods they put in a 
heap and covered them from the rain, and then went to their 
hunting-cabin. Musemeelin, unexpectedly finding two or three 
more Indians there, laid down his goods, and said he had killed 
Jack Armstrong and taken pay for his hoi'se, and should any of 
them discover it, that person he would likewise kill, but otherwise 
they might all take a part of the goods. The young man called 
Jimmy went to Shamokin, after Musemeelin was gone to bury the 
goods, with three more Indians, with whom he had prevailed ; one 
of them was Neshaleeny's son, whom he had ordered to kill James 
Smith; but these Indians would not have any of the goods. Some 
time after the young Indian had been in Shamokin, it was whis- 
pered about that some of the Delaware Indians had killed Arm- 
strong and his men. A drunken Indian came to one of the 
Tudolous houses at night and told the man of the house that he 
could tell him a piece of bad news. "What is that?" said the 
other. The drunken man said, " Some of our Delaware Indians 
have killed Armstrong and his men, which if our chiefs should not 
resent, and take them up, I will kill them myself, to prevent a dis- 
turbance between us and the white people, our brethren." Next 
morning Shickcalamy and some other Indians of the Delawares 
were called to assist Allumoppies in council ; when Shickcalamy 
and Allumoppies got one of the Tudolous Indians to write a letter 
to me, to desire me to come to Shamokin in all haste — that the 
Indians were very much dissatisfied in mind. This letter Avas 
brought to my house by four Delaware Indians, sent express ; but 
I was then in Philadelphia, and when I came home and found all 
particulars mentioned in this letter, and that none of the Indians 
of the Six Nations had been down, I did not care to meddle with 
Delaware Indian affairs, and stayed at home till I received the 



144 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

governor's orders to go, which was about two weeks after. Allu- 
moppics was advised by his council to employ a conjuror, or prophet, 
as they call it, to find out the murderer. Accordingly he did, and 
the Indians met. The seer, being busy all night, told them in the 
morning to examine such and such a one that was present when 
Armstrong was killed, naming the two young men. Musemeelin 
was present. Accordingly, Allumoppies, Quitheyquent, and Thomas 
Green, an Indian, went to him that had fled first, and examined 
him. He told the whole story very freely. Then they went to the 
other, but he would not say a word, and they Avent away and left 
him. The three Indians returned to Shickcalamy and informed them 
of what discovery they had made, when it was agreed to secure the 
murderers and deliver them up to the white people. Then a great 
noise arose among the Delaware Indians, and some were afraid 
of their lives and went into the woods. Not one cared to meddle 
with Musemeelin and the other that could not be prevailed on to 
discover any thing, because of the resentment of their families ; 
but they being pressed by Shickcalamy 's son to secure the 
murderers, otherwise they would be cut off from the chain of 
friendship, four or five of the Delawares made Musemeelin and 
the other young man prisoners, and tied them both. They lay 
twenty-four hours, and none would venture to conduct them down, 
because of the great division among the Delaware Indians ; and 
Allumoppies, in danger of being killed, fled to Shickcalamy and 
begged his protection. At last Shickcalamy's son. Jack, went to 
the Delawares, — most of them being drunk, as they had been for 
several days, — and told them to deliver the prisoners to Alexander 
Armstrong, and they were afraid to do it ; they might separate 
their heads from their bodies and lay them in the canoe, and carry 
them to Alexander to roast and eat them ; that would satisfy his 
revenge, as he wants to eat Indians. They prevailed with the said 
Jack to assist them ; and accordingly he and his brother, and some 
of the Delawares, went with two canoes and carried them ofl'. 

Conrad Weiser, in a letter to a friend, dated Heidelberg, 1746, 
adverts to an interesting incident which occurred at the conclusion 
of this interview at Shamokin. He says, " Two years ago I was 
sent by the governor to Shamokin, on account of the unhappy 
death of John Armstrong, the Indian trader, (1T4-1.) After I had 
performed my errand, there was a feast prepared, to which the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 145 

governor's messengers were invited. There were about one hun- 
dred persons present, to whom, after we had in great silence de- 
voured a fat bear, the eldest of the chiefs made a speech, in 
which he said, that by a great misfortune three of the brethren, 
the white men, had been killed bj an Indian; that, neverthe- 
less, the sun was not set, (meaning there was no war;) it had only 
been somewhat darkened by a small cloud, which was now done 
away. He that had done evil was like to be punished, and the land 
remain in peace ; therefore he exhorted his people to thankfulness 
to God; and thereupon he began to sing Avith an aAvful solemnity, 
but without expressing any words ; the others accompanying him 
with great earnestness of fervor, spoke these words : ' Thanks, 
thanks be to thee, thou great Lord of the world, in that thou hast 
again caused the sun to shine, and hast dispersed the dark cloud ! 
The Indians are thine.' " 

Among the first settlers in Augliwick Yalley was Cap- 
tain Jack, certainly one of the most noted characters of 
his day. He flourished about Augliwick between 1750 
and 1755, when, with two or three companions, he went 
to the Juniata and built himself a cabin near a beautiful 
spring. His sole pursuit, it would appear, was hunting 
and fishing ; by which he procured the means of subsistence 
for his family. There was a mystery about him which no 
person ever succeeded in fathoming, and even his com- 
panions never learned his history or his real name. 

He was a man of almost Herculean proportions, with 
extremely swarthy complexion. In fact, he was suj)posed 
by some to be a half-breed and by others a quadroon. 
Colonel Armstrong, in a letter to the governor, called him 
the "Half-Indian." The truth of it, however, is that he 
was a white man, possessing a more than ordinary share 
of intelligence for a backwoodsman, but his early history 
is altogether shrouded in mystery. It appears that in 

10 



146 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the summer of 1752 Captain Jack and his companions 
were on a fishing excursion. Returning late in the even- 
ing, Jack found his cabin in ruins and his wife and two 
children murdered. From that moment he became an 
altered man, quit the haunts of men, and roamed the 
woods alone, sleeping in caves, hollow logs, or wherever 
he could find a shelter. The loss of his family, no doubt, 
crazed him for a time, as he did not appear among the 
settlers until the fall of 1753. In the interim, however, 
he was frequently seen, and, we may add, frequently /eZ^, 
by the savages, but he studiously avoided all intercourse 
with his fellow-men. If we may judge of his subsequent 
career, there is every reason to believe that on the dis- 
covery of the wrongs done him by the savages he made a 
vow to devote the balance of his life to slaying Indians. 
If he did, right faithfully was his vow kej)t, for his fame 
spread far and wide among the red-skins, and many a one 
bit the dust by his trusty rifle and unerring aim. The 
settlers about Aughwick, as well as those in Path Valley 
and along the river, frequently found dead savages, some 
in a state of partial decay, and others with their flesh 
stripped by the bald-eagles and their bones bleaching in 
the sun on the spot where Jack's rifle had laid them 
low. 

On one occasion Captain Jack had concealed himself in 
the woods hy the side of the Aughwick Path, where he 
lay in wait for a stray Indian. Presently a painted war- 
rior, with a red feather waving from his head and his 
body bedizened with gewgaws recently purchased from a 
trader, came down the path. A crack from Captain Jack's 
rifle, and the savage bounded into the air and fell dead 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 147 

without a groan in the path. It appears that three 
others were in company, but had tarried at a spring, who, 
on hearing the discharge of the rifle, under the impression 
that their companion had shot a deer or bear, gave a 
loud "whoojD." Captain Jack immediately loaded, and 
when the Indians came up to the dead body Jack again 
shot, and killed a second one. The Indians then rushed 
into the thicket, and one of them, getting a glimpse of 
Jack, shot at him, but missed him. The wild hunter, 
seeing that the chances were desperate, jumped out and 
engaged in a hand-to-hand encounter — the fourth savage 
being only armed with a tomahawk. He soon despatched 
the third one by beating his brains out with his rifle; but 
the fourth one, an athletic fellow, grappled, and a long 
and bloody fight with knives followed, and only ceased 
when both were exhausted by the loss of blood. The In- 
dian managed to get away, and left the Black Hunter the 
victor on the field of battle. Weak and faint as Jack was, 
he scalped the three savages, fixed their scalps upon 
bushes overhanging the path, and then, without deigning 
to touch their gewgaws or their arms, he managed to 
work his way to the settlement, where his wounds, con- 
sisting of eight or ten stabs, were dressed. The settlers, 
then squatters, cared little about the loss of the Indians, 
since they deemed it right for Captain Jack to wreak his 
vengeance on any and every savage whom chance should 
throw in his way; and so little did they care about the 
proprietors knowing their whereabouts that no report of 
the case was ever made to the government of this combat. 
It is said that one night the family of an Irishman 
named Moore, residing in Aughwick, w^as suddenly 



148 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

awakened by the report of a gun. This unusual circum- 
stance at such a late hour in the night caused them to 
get up to discover the cause; and on opening the door 
they found a dead Indian lying wpon the very threshold. 
By the feeble light which shone through the door they 
discovered the dim otitline of the wild hunter, who merely 
said " I have saved your lives," and then plunged into the 
dark ravine and disappeared. 

With an eye like the eagle, an aim that was unerring, 
daring intrepidity, and a constitution that could l3rave the 
heat of summer as well as the frosts of winter, he roamed 
the valley like an uncaged tiger, the most formidable foe 
that ever crossed the red man's path. Various were the 
plans and stratagems resorted to by the Indians to capture 
him, but they all proved unavailing. He fought them 
upon their own ground, with their own weapons, and 
against them adopted their own merciless and savage 
mode of warfare. In stratagem he was an adept, and in 
the skilful use of the rifle his superior probably did not 
exist in his day and generation. 

These qualifications not only made him a terror to the 
Indians, but made him famous among the settlers, who 
for their OAvn protection formed a scout, or comjDany of 
rangers, and tendered to Captain Jack the command, 
which he accepted. This company was uniformed like 
Indians, with hunting-shirts, leather leggings, and moc- 
casins, and, as they were not acting under sanction of 
government, styled themselves " Captain Jack's Hunters." 
All the Imnting done, however, after securing game to 
supply their wants, was probably confined to hunting for 
scalps of Indians ; and, as it was a penal offence then to 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 149 

occupy the liunting-grounds of the Juniata Valley, much 
more so to shed the blood of any of the savages, it is not 
likely that the hunters ever furnished the Quaker pro- 
prietors with an official list of the '' killed and wounded." 
These exploits gave Captain Jack a number of names or 
sobriquets in the absence of his real name ; he was knowTi 
as the " Black Rifle," " Black Hunter," "Wild Hunter of 
the Juniata," &c. On one occasion, with his band, he fol- 
low^ed a party of marauding Indians to the Conococheague, 
and put them to rout. This act reached the authorities 
in Philadelphia, and Governor Hamilton granted him a 
sort of irregular roving commission to hold in check the 
unfriendly Indians of the frontier. With this authority 
he routed the savages from the Cove and several other 
places, and the general fear he inspired among them no 
doubt prevented a deal of mischief in the Juniata Valley. 
Early in June, Captain Jack offered the services of him- 
self and liis band of hunters to government to accompany 
Braddock on his expedition against Fort Duquesne. His 
merits were explained to Braddock by George Crogan, 
who said, " They are well armed, and are equally regard- 
less of heat or cold. They require no shelter for the night, 
and ash no loa.y." This generous offer on the part of Cap- 
tain Jack was not accepted by Braddock, because, as he 
alleged, "the proffered services were coupled with certain 
stipulations to which he could not consent." What these 
stipulations were was not mentioned. It is presumed, 
however, that Captain Jack wished his company to go as 
a volunteer force, free from the restraints of a camp life 
which a rigid disciplinarian like Braddock would be likely 
to adopt. Braddock had already accepted the services of 



150 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

a company of Indians under George Crogan, and, as he 
wished to gain hiurels for himself and his troops by achiev- 
ing a victory over the French and Indians by open Euro- 
pean fighting, his own selfishness probably iDromptcd him 
to refuse the assistance of any more who adopted the 
skulking Indian mode of warfare. He did not live, how- 
ever, to discover his error, Hazzard, in his Pennsylvania 
Eegister, in speaking of the non-acceptance of Captain 
Jack's offer, says, " It was a great misfortune for Braddock 
that he nedected to secure the services of such an auxi- 
liary." Very true ; for such men as Jack's Hunters would 
never have suffered themselves to be fired upon by an am- 
buscaded enemy or an enemy hid away in a ravine. They 
would not have marched over the hill with drums beating 
and colors flying, in pride and pomp, as if enjoying a 
victory not yet won; but they would have had their scouts 
out, the enemy and his position known, and the battle fought 
without any advantages on either side; and in such an 
event it is more than j)robable that victory would have 
crowned the expedition. 

Of the final end of Captain Jack we have nothing 
definite. One account says he went to the West; another 
that he died an old man in 1772, having lived the life of 
a hermit after the end of the war of 1763. It is said that 
his bones rest near the spring, at the base of the mountain 
bearing his name; and this we are inclined to believe. 
The early settlers of the neighborhood believed that Cap- 
tain Jack came down from the mountain every night at 
twelve o'clock to slake his thirst at his favorite spring; 
and half a century ago we might readily have produced 
the affidavits of twenty respectable men who had seen the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 151 

Black Hunter in the spirit roaming over the land that was 
his in the flesh. The present generation, however, knows 
little about the wild hunter. Still, though he sleeps the 
sleep that knows no waking, and no human being who 
ever saw him is above the sod now, the towering moun- 
tain, a hundred miles in length, bearing his name, will 
stand as an indestructable monument to his memory until 
time shall be no more. 

George Crogan figured extensively about Aughwick for 
many years, both before and after Fort Shirley was built. 
He was an Irishman by birth, and came to the colony 
probably as early as 1742, and soon after took up the 
business of an Indian trader. At first he located at 
Harris's trading-house, on the Susquehanna, and from 
thence moved over the river into Cumberland county, 
some eight miles from his first place of abode. From 
there he made excursions to Path Valley and Aughwick, 
and finally to the Ohio River by way of the old Bedford trail. 
His long residence among the Indians not only enabled him 
to study Indian character thoroughly, but he acquired the 
language of both the Delaware and Shawnee tribes, and 
was of great use to the proprietary government ; but Ave 
incline to the opinion that his services were illy requited. 

His first letter, published in the Colonial Records, is 
dated "May j' 2Gth, 1747," and is directed to Richard 
Peters. It was accompanied by a letter from the Six 
Nations, some wampum, and a French scalp, taken some- 
where on Lake Erie. 

In a letter from Governor Hamilton to Governor Hardy, 
dated 5th July, 1756, in speaking of Crogan, who was at 
one time suspected of being a spy in the pay of the 



152 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

French, Hamilton says: — "There were many Indian 
traders with Eraddock — Crogan among others, who acted 
as a captain of the Indians under a warrant from General 
Braddock, and I never heard of any objections to his con- 
duct in that capacity. For many years he had been very 
largely concerned in the Ohio trade, was upon that river 
frequently, and had a considerable influence among the 
Indians, speaking the language of several nations, and 
being very liberal, or rather profuse, in his gifts to them, 
which, with the losses he sustained by the French, who 
seized great quantities of his goods, and by not getting the 
debts due to him from the Indians, he became bankrupt, 
and since has lived at a place called Aughwick, in the 
back parts of this province, where he generally had a 
number of Indians with him, for the maintenance of 
whom the province allowed him sums of money from 
time to time, but not to his satisfaction. After this he 
went, by my order, with these Indians, and joined 
General Braddock, who gave the warrant I have men- 
tioned. Since Braddock's defeat, he returned to Augh- 
wick, where he remained till an act of assembly was 
passed here granting him a freedom from arrest for ten 
years. This was done that the province might have 
the benefit of his knowledge of the woods and his in- 
fluence among the Indians; and immediately thereujDon, 
while I was last at York, a captain's commission was 
given to him, and he was ordered to raise men for the 
defence of the western frontier, which he did in a very 
expeditious manner, but not so frugally as the com- 
missioners for disposing of the public money thought he 
might have done. He continued in the command of one 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 153 

of the companies he had raised, and of Fort Shirley, on the 
western frontier, about three months; during which time 
he sent, by my direction, Indian messengers to the Ohio 
for intelligence, but never produced me any that was very 
material; and, having a dispute with the commissioners 
about some accounts between them, in which he thought 
himself ill-used, he resigned his commission, and about a 
month ago informed me that he had not received pay 
upon General Braddock's warrant, and desired my recom- 
mendation to General Shirley; wliicli I gave him, and he 
set off directly for Albany; and I hear he is now at 
Onondago with Sir William Johnston." 

Crogan settled permanently in Aughwick in 1754, and 
built a stockade fort, and must have been some kind of an 
agent among the Indians, disbursing presents to them for 
the government. In December of that year he wrote to 
Secretary Peters, stating the wants of his Indians, and at 
the same time wrote to Governor Morris as follows : — 

"Jfn'y it please your honor: — 

"I am Oblig"! to advertize the Inhabitance of Cumberland county 
in y honour's Name, nott to barter or Sell Spiretus Liquors to the 
Indians or any person to bring amongst them, to prevent y« Indians 
from Spending there Cloase, tho' I am oblige to give them a kag 
Now and then my self for a frolick, but that is Atended with no 
Expence to y^ Government, nor no bad consequences to ye Indians 
as I do itt butt onst a Month. I hope your honour will approve of 
this Proceeding, as I have Don itt to Prevent ill consequences 
atending y^ Indians if they should be Kept always Infleam'i with 
Liquors." 

In September, 1754, notwithstanding the precautions 
taken by the government to conciliate the Indians by pro- 
fuse presents, and immediately after Conrad Weiser, the 



154 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Indian interpreter, and Crogan, had held a conference at 
Aughwick, which it was supposed had terminated satis- 
factorily to all parties concerned, an Indian, named Is- 
rael, of the Six Nations, after leaving the conference, 
perpetrated a brutal murder in Tuscarora Valley. The 
following is Crogan's report of it to government : — 

Aughidclt, September 17, 1754. 

May it please Your Honor: — 

Since Mr. Weiser left this, an Indian of the Six Nations, named 
Israel, killed one Joseph Cample, an Indian trader, at the house 
of one Anthony Thompson, at the foot of the Tuscarora Valley, 
near Parn all's Knob. As soon as I heard it I went down to 
Thompson's, and took several of the chiefs of the Indians with 
me, when I met William Maxwell, Esq. The Indian made his 
escape before I got there. I took the qualification of the persons 
who were present at the murder, and delivered them to Mr. Max- 
well, to be sent to your honor, with the speech made by the chiefs 
of the Indians on that occasion, which I suppose your honor has 
received. 

I have heard many accounts from Ohio since Mr. Weiser left 
this, all of which agree that the French have received a reinforce- 
ment of men and provision from Canada to the fort. An Indian 
returned yesterday to this place whom I had sent to the fort for 
intelligence; he confirms the above accounts, and further says 
there were about sixty French Indians had come while he stayed 
there, and that they expected better than two hundred more every 
day. He says that the French design to send those Indians with 
some French, in several parties, to annoy the back settlements, 
which the French say will put a stop to any English forces march- 
ing out this fall to attack them. This Indian likewise says that 
the French will do their endeavor to have the half-king Scar- 
rayooday. Captain Montour, and myself, killed this fall. This In- 
dian, I think, is to be believed, if there can be any credit given to 
what an Indian says. He presses me strongly to leave this place, 
and not live in any of the back parts. The scheme of sending 
several parties to annoy the back settlements seems so much like 
French policy that I can't help thinking it true. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 155 

I hear from Colonel Innes that there certainly have hcen some 
French Indians at the camp at Wills's Creek, who fired on the 
sentry in the dead of the night. If the French prosecute this 
scheme, I don't know what will become of the back parts of Cum- 
berland county, which is much exposed. The back parts of Vir- 
ginia and Maryland are covered by the English camp, so that most 
of the inhabitants are safe. 

I would have written to your honor before now on this head ; I 
only waited the return of this Indian messenger, whose account I 
really think is to be depended on. The Indians here seem very 
uneasy at their long stay, as they have heard nothing from the 
Governor of Virginia nor of your honor since Mr. Weiser went 
away; nor do they see the English making any preparations to 
attack the French, which seems to give them a great deal of con- 
cern. I believe several of the Indians will soon go to the Six 
Nation country, and then, I suppose, the rest will be obliged to 
fall in with the French. If this happens, then all the back settle- 
ments will be left to the mercy of an outrageous enemy. 

I beg your honor's pardon for mentioning the consequences 
which must certainly attend the slow motion of the English go- 
vernment, as they are well known to your honor, and I am sen- 
sible your honor had done all in your power for the security of 
those parts. I hope as soon as his honor, Governor Morris, is 
arrived, I shall hear what is to be done with those Indians. I 
assure your honor it will not be in my power to keep them together 
much longer. 

I am your honor's most humble and most obedient servant, 

Geo. Crogan. 

The Indian Israel was arrested, taken to Philadelphia, 
and tried, but, in consequence of the critical situation of 
affairs, the French having tampered with the Six Nations 
until they were wavering, he was let off, returned to his 
tribe, and the matter smoothed over as best it could 
under the circumstances. 

The number of Indians under Crogan at Braddock's 
defeat was thirty ; but what part they performed on that 



156 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

eventful day was not recorded. That Crogan and his 
Indians were of some service would appear from the fact 
that the Assembly passed a law exempting him from 
arrests — for debt, it is supposed — for ten years, and 
commissioning him a captain in the colonial service. 

The supposition that Crogan was a spy in the pay 
of the French was based upon the idea that he was 
a Roman Catholic, inasmuch as he was born in Dublin. 
His loyalty was first brought into question by Governor 
Sharpe, in December, 1753, who wrote to Governor 
Hamilton, informing him that the French knew every 
move for defence made in the colonies, and asked his 
opinion of Crogan. In answer, Governor Hamilton 
said : — 

I observe what you say of Mr. Crogan; and, though the several 
matters of •which you have received information carry in them a 
good deal of suspicion, and it may be highly necessary to keep a 
watchful eye upon him, yet I hope they will not turn out to be any 
thing very material, or that will effect his faithfulness to the trust 
reposed in him, which, at this time, is of great importance and a 
very considerable one. At present I have no one to inquire of as 
to the truth of the particulars mentioned in yours but Mr. Peters, 
who assures me that Mr. Crogan has never been deemed a Roman 
Catholic, nor does he believe that he is one, though he knows not 
his education, which was in Dublin, nor his religious profession. 

Whatever Mr. Crogan's religious faith may have been, 
he paid much less attention to it than he did to Indian 
affairs ; and that he was deeply devoted to the proprietary 
government is evident from his subsequent career. To 
keep the Indians loyal, he advanced many presents to 
them, as appears by Governor Morris's letter to Governor 
Hardy, for which he never was reimbursed; and the com- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 157 

pany of Indians he commanded was fitted out at his own 
expense ; and it was the attemf)t to get what he advanced 
on that occasion that led to his quarrel with the com- 
missioners and his resignation. 

From Philadelphia he went to Onondago, in September, 
1756, and soon after was appointed deputy-agent of Indian 
affairs by Sir William Johnston. On his arrival in Phila- 
delphia, his appointment was announced to the council by 
Governor Denny. 

''The council, knowing Mr. Crogan's circumstances, 
was not a little surprised at the appointment, and desired 
to see his credentials;" which he produced, and again took 
an active part in Indian affairs. 

After the French had evacuated Fort Duquesne, in 
1758, Crogan resided for a time in Fort Pitt. From 
there he went down the river, was taken prisoner by 
the French, and taken to Detroit. From thence he re- 
turned to New York, where he died in 1782. 

On the 6th of October, 1754, the reigning chief of 
Aughwick, called Tanacliarrisan, or Half-King, died at 
Paxton. In communicating his death to the governor, 
John Harris said: — 

Those Indians that are here blame the French for his death, by 
bewitching him, as they had a conjurer to inquire into the cause a 
few days before he died ; and it is his opinion, together with his 
relations, that the French have been the cause of their great 
man's death, by reason of his striking them lately; for which 
they seem to threaten immediate revenge, and desire me to let it 
be known. 

The loss of the Half-King must have been a severe 
affliction to his tribe, for it appears by a letter of Cro- 



158 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

gan'.s that he was compelled to "wipe away their tears 
to the amount of thirty pounds fourteen shillings :" 

Scarroyady'^ succeeded the Half-King in the adminis- 
tration of affairs at Aughwick. He was a brave and 
powerful chief, and possessed the most unbounded in- 
fluence among the Indians. Governor Morris, in a 
speech, previously approved by council, made to Scar- 
royady and some Indians accompanying him, said: — 

"Brethren: — For the encouragement of you and all who -will 
join you in the destruction of our enemies, I propose to give the 
following bounties or rewards, viz. : for every male Indian prisoner 
above twelve years old that shall be delivered at any of the govern- 
ment's forts or towns, one hundred and fifty dollars. 

" For every female Indian prisoner or male prisoner of twelve 
years old and under, delivered as above, one hundred and thirty 
dollars. 

" For the scalp of every male Indian of above twelve years old, 
one hundred and thirty dollars. 

" For the scalp of every Indian woman, fifty dollars." 

Let this fixed price for scalps not stand upon the pages 
of history as a stigma against the peaceable and non- 
resistant Quakers of the province ; for, at the time these 
bounties were offered, John and Thomas Penn had abjured 
the habits, customs, and religion of that people. 

Fort Shirley was built in Aughwick Valley in the fall 
of 1755, and the winter following Crogan resigned his 
commission, after which the command was given to Cap- 
tain Hugh Mercer. 



* As the Indians could not pronounce the letter r, it is probable that the 
names haviug such letters in were bestowed by the whites, or corrupted 
by them. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 159 

Tradition says that one or two very serious battles were 
fought in Aughwick, after Fort Shirley was erected ; but 
the accounts of them are so vague that we can give no- 
thing like reliable information touching them. 

In January, 1756, two Indians named Lackin, brothers, 
who professed to be friendly, came to what was then still 
called Crogan's Fort. The commander of the fort made 
them some few trifling presents, and plied them well with 
rum, when they promised to bring in a large number of 
prisoners and scalps. On leaving the fort, they fell in 
with a soldier, whom they invited to accompany them a 
short distance and they would give him some rum. To 
this the soldier assented, and, after getting out of sight of 
the fort, one of them suddenly turned and stabbed the 
soldier in the side with a scalping-knife. A man passing 
at the time of the occurrence immediately alarmed the 
garrison, and a posse of thirteen men sallied out ; but when 
they came up near the Indians the latter suddenly turned 
and fired upon the soldiers, wounding one of them in the 
thigh. The savages were then surrounded, and one of 
them shot; the other they attempted to take to the fort 
alive, but he acted so outrageously that one of the soldiers 
beat his brains out with the stock of his musket. The 
Lackins w^ere rather worthless fellows, and it required no 
wampum, or even coin, to dry uj) the tears of their 
friends. 

Fort Shirley w^as abandoned for a while after the burn- 
ing of Fort Granville, by order of Governor Morris, but 
the importance of the point prevented it from standing 
idle long. We hear of some few murders committed near 
the Three Springs of the valley at a later day, but no attack 



100 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

was made in the neighborhood during the second Indian 
war, as the entire valley Avas well protected by the friendly 
Indians of the Six Nations. 

The Delawares and Shawnees, or at least a great por- 
tion of them, left the valley in 1754-55-56, and before 1761 
all liad disappeared. But to the friendly Indian the beau- 
tiful Aughwick was a favorite haunt until the Anglo- 
iSaxon fairly jDloughed and harrowed him out of his home 
and his hunting-grounds. The last of the Six Nations 
left Aughwick for Cattaraugus in 1771. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 161 



CHAPTER XII. 

RAYSTOWN BRANCH — EARLY SETTLEMENT OF RAYSTOWN — GENERAL 
rORBES'S EXPEDITION — COLONELS "WASHINGTON AND BOQUET^COLO- 

NEL Armstrong's letter — smith and his black boys — bloody 

RUN — robbery — INDIAN MASSACRES — REVOLUTIONARY LIEUTENANTS 
OP BEDFORD COUNTY, ETC. 

The earliest settlement on the Raystown Branch of the 
Juniata was made by a man named Ray, in 1751, who 
built three cabins near where Bedford now stands. In 
1755 the province agreed to open a wagon-road from 
Fort Louden, in Cumberland county, to the forks of the 
Youghiogheny River. For this purpose three hundred 
men were sent up, but for some cause or other the project 
was abandoned. 

This road was completed in 1758, when the allied forces 
of Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania marched against 
Fort Duquesne, under General John Forbes. About the 
same year the fort was built at Raystown, and called Fort 
Bedford. Colonels Boquet and Washington first marched 
to Bedford with the advance, and were followed by 
General Forbes, who had been detained by illness at Car- 
lisle. The successful troops that put to rout the French 

without striking a blow, amounting to 7850 men, were 

11 



162 HISTORY OF THE JUKIATA VALLEY. 

reviewed, where Bedford now stands, a little over ninety- 
seven years ago. Of the triumphant march and the blood- 
less victory of General Forbes and Colonels Boquet and 
Washington there is little use in speaking here, more 
than incidentally mentioning that, profiting by the dear- 
bought experience at Braddock's defeat, the suggestion of 
Washington to fight the savages after their own manner 
was adopted, and, after defeating them in several skir- 
mishes, the Indians fled before them like chaff before the 
wind, and when they reached Fort Duquesne the name 
and the fort alone remained. The latter was preserved, 
but the former was speedily changed to Fort Pitt. 

Colonel Armstrong, whose name has already frequently 
appeared, served as a captain in the expedition under 
General Forbes against Fort Duquesne. It may also be 
as well to remember that Colonel Washington, as well 
as the Virginians generally, jealous of the Pennsyl- 
vanians gaining a footing in the Monongahela country, vio- 
lently opposed the cutting of the road from Raystown to 
the mouth of the Yough, and urged strongly upon Forbes 
the propriety of using the old Braddock trail. The de- 
cision of General Forbes procured for the people of Penn- 
sylvania a wagon-road over the Alleghany at least twenty 
years before the inhabitants would have entertained the 
idea of so formidable an undertaking. Armstrong wrote 
to Eichard Peters, under date of " Raystown, October 3, 
1758," from whose letter w^e extract the following: — 

Since our Quixotic expedition you will, no doubt, be greatly 
perplexed about our fate. God knows what it may be; but, I 
assure you, the better part of the troops are not at all dismayed. 
The general came here at a critical and seasonable juncture ; he is 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 163 

weak, but his spirit is good and his head clear, firmly determined 
to proceed as far as force and provisions will admit, which, through 
divine favor, will be far enough. The road to be opened from our 
advanced post is not yet fully determined, and must be further 
reconnoitered : 'tis yet a query whether the artillery will be car- 
ried forward with the army when within fifteen or twenty miles of 
the fort or not. The order of march and line of battle is under con- 
sideration, and there are many different opinions respecting it. Upon 
this the general will have a conference with the commanders of the 
sundry corps. About four thousand five hundred are yet fit for 
duty, five or six hundred of which may be laid to the account of 
keeping of different posts, sickness, accidents, &c. We know not 
the number of the enemy, but they are greatly magnified, by report 
of sundry of the people with Major Grant, to what we formerly ex- 
pected. The Virginians are much chagrined at the opening of the 
road through this government, and Colonel Washington has been 
a good deal sanguine and obstinate upon the occasion; but the 
presence of the general has been of great use on this as well as 
other accounts. We hear that three hundred wagons are on the 
road. If this month happens to be dry weather, it will be greatly 
in our favor. My people are in general healthy, and are to be 
collected together immediately, except such as are posted on the 
communication and in the artillery. Many of them will be naked 
by the end of the campaign, but I dare not enter upon clothing 
them, not knowing who or how many of the troops may be con- 
tinued. Colonel B 1 is a very sensible and useful man; not- 
withstanding, had not the general come up, the consequences would 
have been dangerous. Please to make my compliments to Mr. 
Allen, and, if you please, show him this letter, as I have not a 
moment longer to write. About the last of this month will be the 
critical hour. Every thing is vastly dear Avith us, and the money 
goes like old boots. The enemy are beginning to kill and carry 
ofi" horses, and every now and then scalp a wandering person. 

I leave this place to-day, as does Colonel Boquet and some 
pieces of the artillery. 

In 1763, Fort Bedford was tlie principal depot for 
military stores between Carlisle and Fort Pitt. In order 
to strengthen it, the command was given to Captain 



164 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Ourry, and the small stockades at the Juniata Crossing 
and Stony Creek were abandoned and the force concen- 
trated at Bedford. By this means two volunteer com- 
panies were formed to guard the fort, which, besides being 
a refuge for the distressed families for ten or fifteen miles 
around, contained vast quantities of ammunition and 
other government stores. 

In 1763, Colonel Boquet again passed up the Raystown 
Branch with two regiments of regulars and a large con- 
voy of military stores, to relieve the beleaguered garrison 
at Fort Pitt. He found matters in a deplorable condition 
at Fort Bedford. The Indians, although they had never 
made an attack upon the fort, had for weeks been hover- 
ing around the frontier settlements, and had killed, 
scalped, or taken prisoner, no less than eighteen per- 
sons. This induced Colonel Boquet to leave two com- 
panies of his army at Bedford. 

The names of the persons killed or taken prisoners at 
that time are not recorded, and, we regret to say, few of 
any of the particulars connected therevv^ith have been pre- 
served. 

The town of Bedford was laid out by John Lukens, the 
surveyor-general, in 1766, and took its name (in honor 
of the Duke of Bedford) from the fort. The toAvn for 
many years was the most prominent point between Car- 
lisle and Pittsburg. The county was formed out of Cum- 
berland, in 1771, and embraced a vast extent of territory, 
from which Huntingdon, Mifflin, Cambria, Somerset, 
Westmoreland, Fulton, and Indiana, were subsequently 
taken. 

During the Revolutionary war, the town of Bedford 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 165 

proper, as well as the surrounding country, was so well 
settled that the Indians kept a respectful distance. On 
Yellow Creek, one of the tributaries of Raystown Branch, 
settlements were made at an early day; also in the 
Great Cove. During the Revolution, Colonel John Piper, 
of Yellow Creek, was the lieutenant-colonel of the 
county, and George Ashman lieutenant, and James Mar- 
tin, Edward Combs, and Robert Culbertson, were sub- 
lieutenants. 

Colonel James Smith, whose narrative has been pub- 
lished in several works, was taken by the Indians in 1755, 
near Bedford. He was taken to Fort Duquesne, and was 
there when the victorious Frenchmen and savages returned 
with the scalps and plunder taken from Braddock's van- 
quished army. After undergoing some severe trials, such 
as running the gauntlet, &c.. Smith was taken to Ohio, 
and, after a ceremony of baptizing, painting, and hair- 
pulling, he was adopted, as a warrior "in good standing," 
into the Conowaga tribe. No other resort being left, as a 
measure of self-defence he adopted the manners and cus- 
toms of the tribe, and wandered over the West with them 
until an opportunity offered to escape; which did not 
occur until he reached Montreal, in 1760, when he ob- 
tained his freedom in the general exchange of prisoners 
which took place. 

In 1765, Smith figured conspicuously in Bedford 
county, as the leader of the celebrated band of ^^ Black 
BoTjs^' whose singular and summary administration of jus- 
tice bore a marked affinity to the code sometimes adopted 
by that worthy disseminator of criminal jurisprudence in 



166 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the A¥est, — "Judge Lynch," Of the exploits of the 
famous Black Boys Smith speaks as follows : — 

Shortly after this (1764) the Indians stole horses and killed 
some people on the frontiers. The king's proclamation was then 
circulating, and set up in various public places, prohibiting any 
person from trading with the Indians until further orders. 

Notwithstanding all this, about the 1st of March, 1765, a num- 
ber of wagons, loaded with Indian goods and warlike stores, were 
sent from Philadelphia to Henry Pollens, Conococheague ; and 
from thence seventy pack-horses were loaded with these goods, in 
order to carry them to Fort Pitt. This alarmed the country, and 
Mr. William Duffield raised about fifty armed men, and met the 
pack-horses at the place where Mercersburg now stands. Mr. 
Duffield desired the employers to store up their goods and not pro- 
ceed until further orders. They made light of this, and went over 
the North Mountain, where they lodged in a small valley called the 
Great Cove. Mr. Duffield and his party followed after, and came 
to their lodging, and again urged them to store up their goods. 
He reasoned with them on the impropriety of their proceedings 
and the great danger the frontier inhabitants would be exposed to 
if the Indians should now get a supply. He said as it was well 
known that they had scarcely any ammunition, and were almost 
naked, to supply them now would be a kind of murder, and would 
be illegally trading at the expense of the blood and treasure of the 
frontiers. Notwithstanding his powerful reasoning, these traders 
made game of what he said, and would only answer him by ludi- 
crous burlesque. 

When I beheld this, and found that Mr. Duffield could not com- 
pel them to store up their goods, I collected ten of my old warriors 
that I had formerly disciplined in the Indian way, went off privately 
after night, and encamped in the woods. The next day, as usual, 
we blacked and painted, and waylaid them near Sideling Hill. I 
scattered my men about forty rods along the side of the road, and 
ordered every two to take a tree, and about eight or ten rods 
between each couple, with orders to keep a reserved fire — one not 
to fire until his comrade had loaded his gun. By this means we 
kept a constant slow fire upon them, from front to rear. We then 
heard nothing of these traders' merriment or burlesque. When 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 167 

they saw their pack-horses falling close by them, they called out, 
"Pray, gentlemen, what would you have us to do?" The reply 
was, "Collect all your loads to the front, and unload them in 
one place ; take your private property, and immediately retire." 
AVhen they were gone, we burnt what they left, which con- 
sisted of blankets, shirts, vermilion, lead, beads, wampum, toma- 
hawks, scalping-knives, &c. 

The traders went back to Fort Louden, and applied to the com- 
manding officer there, and got a party of Highland soldiers, and 
went with them in quest of the robbers, as they called us; and, 
without applying to a magistrate or obtaining any civil authority, 
but purely upon suspicion, they took a number of creditable 
persons, (who were chiefly not anyway concerned in this action,) 
and confined them in the guard-house in Fort Louden. I then 
raised three hundred riflemen, marched to Fort Louden, and 
encamped on a hill in sight of the fort. We were not long there 
until we had more than double as many of the British troops 
prisoners in our camp as they had of our people in the guard- 
house. Captain Grant, a Highland ofiicer who commanded Fort 
Louden, then sent a flag of truce to our camp, where we settled 
a cartel and gave them above two for one ; which enabled us to 
redeem all our men from the guard-house without further difiiculty. 

This exploit of the Black Boys is supposed to have given 
Bloody Run its name. Soon after, some British officer 
wrote an account of the affair and transmitted it to 
London, where it was published, and from which the 
following is an extract. "The convoy of eighty horses, 
loaded with goods, chiefly on His Majesty's account, as 
presents to the Indians, and part on account of Indian 
traders, were surprised in a narrow and dangerous defile 
in the mountains by a body of armed men. A number 
of horses were killed, and the whole of the goods were 
carried away by the plunderers. The rivulet was dyed 
with hlood, and ran into the settlement below, carrying with 
it the stain of crime upon its surface." 



168 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Notwithstanding Smith's narrative may have l3een 
read by a majority of our readers, we cannot resist the 
temptation of transferring another graphic picture of 
frontier life from his work. He says : — 

In the year 1769, the Indians again made incursions on the 
frontiers; yet the traders continued carrying goods and warlike 
stores to them. The frontiers took the alarm, and a number of 
persons collected, destroyed, and plundered, a quantity of their 
powder, lead, &c., in Bedford county. Shortly after this, some of 
these persons, with others, were apprehended and laid in irons in 
the guard-house in Fort Bedford, on suspicion of being the per- 
petrators of this crime. 

Though I did not altogether approve of the conduct of this new 
club of Black Boys, yet I concluded that they should not lie in 
irons in the guard-house or remain in confinement by arbitrary or 
military power. I resolved, therefore, if possible, to release them, 
if they even should be tried by the civil law afterward. I col- 
lected eighteen of my old Black Boys that I had seen tried in the 
Indian war, &c. I did not desire a large party, lest they should be 
too much alarmed at Bedford, and accordingly be prepared for us. 
We marched along the public road in daylight, and made no secret 
of our design. We told those whom we met that we were going 
to take Fort Bedford, which appeared to them a very unlikely 
story. Before this, I made it known to one William Thompson, 
a man whom I could trust, and Avho lived there. Him I employed 
as a spy, and sent him along on horseback before, with orders to 
meet me at a certain place near Bedford one hour before day. 
The next day, a little before sunset, we enca,mped near the Cross- 
ings of Juniata, about fourteen miles from Bedford, and erected 
tents, as though we intended staying all night ; and not a man in 
my company knew to the contrary save myself. Knowing that 
they would hear this in Bedford, and wishing it to be the case, I 
thought to surprise them by stealing a march. 

As the moon rose about eleven o'clock, I ordered my boys to 
march, and we went on, at the rate of five miles an hour, until we 
met Thompson at the place appointed. He told us that the com- 
manding officer had frequently heard of us by travellers, and had 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 169 

ordered thirty men upon guard. He said they knew our number, 
and only made game of the notion of eighteen men coming to 
rescue the prisoners ; but they did not expect us until toward 
the middle of the day. I asked him if the gate was open. lie 
said it was then shut, but he expected they would open it, as usual, 
at daylight, as they apprehended no danger. I then moved my 
men privately up under the banks of the Juniata, where we lay 
concealed about one hundred yards from the fort gate. I had 
ordered the men to keep a profound silence until we got into it. I 
then sent off Thompson again to spy. At daylight he returned 
and told us that the gate was open, and three sentinels were stand- 
ing upon the wall ; that the guards were taking a morning dram, 
and the arms standing together in one place. I then concluded 
to rush into the fort, and told Thompson to run before me to 
the arms. We ran with all our might ; and, as it was a misty 
morning, the sentinels scarcely saw us until we were within the 
gate and took possession of the arms. Just as we were entering, two 
of them discharged their guns, though I do not believe they aimed 
at us. We then raised a shout, which surprised the town, though 
some of them were well pleased with the news. We compelled a 
blacksmith to take the irons off the prisoners, and then we left the 
place. This, I believe, Avas the first British fort in America that 
was taken by what they call American rebels. 

For this exploit Smith was arrested, and, in the scuflde 
which attended the arrest — for he made a powerful resist- 
ance, — one of his captors was shot. He w^as taken to 
Carlisle and tried for murder; but, having the sympathies 
of the people with him, he was triumphantly acquitted. 
He afterward filled several important stations, and for a 
time served as a colonel in the Revolutionary army in 
New Jersey. In 1778 he moved to Kentucky, and joined 
Mcintosh in his efforts against the savages. He had 
evidently imbibed the habits of frontier life so thoroughly 
that the strict routine of military discipline and its re 
straints were totally unsuited to his ideas of fighting. 



170 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

After the year 1769, numerous robberies were com- 
mitted near Bedford. The robbers taking the precaution 
to blacken their faces, all their crimes, as well as many 
others, were charged upon Smith's Black Boys, until they 
were looked upon as a band of outlaws. Under date of 
January 26, 1773, John Frazer and George Woods wrote 
from Bedford to Governor Penn, as follows : — 

May it please Your Honor : — 

The many robberies that have lately been committed in the 
eastern parts of this county oblige us to trouble you with this 
letter. 

There are a number of people, who, we suspect, now reside at or 
near the Sideling Hill, that have been guilty of several highway- 
robberies, and have taken from different people — travelling on the 
public road between this place and Carlisle — considerable sums of 
money; in particular, a certain James McCashlan, of this place, 
hath made oath before us that he has been robbed of twenty-two 
pounds and a silver watch. We have already done our endeavor 
to apprehend the robbers, but have not succeeded, as there can be 
no positive proof made who they are, on account of their blacking 
themselves, which renders it impossible for any person robbed to 
discover or know who are the perpetrators. 

We, therefore, pray your honor would take this matter into con- 
sideration, and grant us such relief as your honor may seem most 
reasonable for the safety of the public in general, and in particular 
for the inhabitants of this county. 

These magistrates labored under the conviction that 
the highwaymen were none else than a portion of Smith's 
gang of Black Boys ; or else why ask government for aid to 
disperse a few robbers, when men, arms, and ammunition, 
were plenty in Bedford? 

The letter of Frazer and Woods was accompanied by 
an affidavit from McCashlan, setting forth that he was 
robbed, and that he had cause to suspect " a certain John 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 171 

Gibson and William Paxton" of committing the robbery. 
These were two of Smith's Black Boys; but it subse- 
quently appeared that a couple of independent footpads 
had relieved Mr. McCashlan of his pounds and watch, 
and not a party of the regular Black Boys, who, no doubt, 
had sins enough of their own to answer for, without 
having all the depredations committed in the county 
placed to their account. 

Although we spared no effort to get some account of 
the Indian massacres near Bedford during the Revolution, 
we failed, and must content ourself — if we do not our 
readers — ^by giving the two following, which we copy from 
Mr. Day's " Historical Collections :" — 

About December, 1777, a number of families came into the fort 
from the neighborhood of Johnstown. Among them were Samuel 
Adams, one Thornton, and Bridges. After the alarm had some- 
what subsided, they agreed to return to their property. A party 
started with pack-horses, reached the place, and, not seeing any 
Indians, collected their property and commenced their return. 
After proceeding some distance, a dog belonging to one of the 
party showed signs of uneasiness and ran back. Bridges and 
Thornton desired the others to wait while they would go back for 
him. They went back, and had proceeded but two or three hun- 
dred yards when a body of Indians, who had been lying in wait on 
each side of the way, but who had been afraid to fire on account 
of the number of the whites, suddenly rose up and took them 
prisoners. The others, not knowing what detained their com- 
panions, went back after them. When they arrived near the spot 
the Indians fired on them, but without doing any injury. The 
whites instantly turned and fled, excepting Samuel Adams, who 
took a tree, and began to fight in the Indian style. In a few 
minutes, however, he was killed, but not without doing the same 
fearful service for his adversary. He and one of the Indians shot 
at and killed each other at the same moment. When the news 
reached the fort a party volunteered to visit the ground. When 



172 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

they reached it, although the snow had fallen ankle-deep, they 
readily found the bodies of Adams and the Indian, the face of the 
latter having been covered by his companions with Adams's hunt- 
ing-shirt. 

A singular circumstance also occurred about that time in the 
neighborhood of the Alleghany Mountain. A man named Wells 
had made a very considerable improvement, and was esteemed 
rather wealthy for that region. He, like others, had been forced 
with his family from his house, and had gone for protection to the 
fort. In the fall of the year, he concluded to return to his place 
and dig his crop of potatoes. For that purpose, he took with him 
six or seven men, an Irish servant girl to cook, and an old plough- 
horse. After they had finished their job, they made preparations 
to return to the fort the next day. During the night, Wells 
dreamed that on his way to his family he had been attacked and 
gored by a bull ; and so strong an impression did the dream make 
that he mentioned it to his companions, and told them that he was 
sure some danger awaited them. He slept again, and dreamed 
that he was about to shoot a deer, and, when cocking his gun, the 
main-spring broke. In his dream he thought he heard distinctly 
the crack of the spring when it broke. He again awoke, and his 
fears were confirmed, and he immediately urged his friends to rise 
and get ready to start. Directly after he arose he went to his 
gun to examine it, and, in cocking it, the main-spring snapped ofi". 
This circumstance alarmed them, and they soon had breakfast, and 
were ready to leave. To prevent delay, the girl was put on the 
horse and started ofi", and, as soon as it was light enough, the 
rest followed. Before they had gone far, a young dog, belonging 
to Wells, manifested much alarm, and ran back to the house. 
Wells called him, but, after going a short distance, he invariably 
ran back. 

Not wishing to leave him, as he was valuable, he went after him, 
but had gone only a short distance toward the house, when five 
Indians rose from behind a large tree that had fallen, and ap- 
proached him with extended hands. The men who were with him 
fled instantly, and he would have followed, but the Indians were 
so close that he thought it useless. As they approached him, 
however, he fancied the looks of a very powerful Indian, who 
was nearest him, boded no good, and being a swift runner, and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 173 

thinking it " neck or nothing" at any rate, determined to attempt 
an escape. As the Indian approached, he threw at him his useless 
rifle, and dashed ofi" toward the woods in the direction his com- 
panions had gone. Instead of firing, the Indians commenced a 
pursuit, for the purpose of making him a prisoner, but he outran 
them. After running some distance, and when they thought he 
would escape, they all stopped and fired at once, and every bullet 
struck him, but without doing him much injury or retarding his 
flight. Soon after this he saw where his companions concealed 
themselves, and, as he passed, he begged them to fire on the Indians, 
and save him ; but they Avere afraid, and kept quiet. He continued 
his flight, and, after a short time, overtook the girl with the horse. 
She quickly understood his danger, and dismounted instantly, 
urging him to take her place, while she would save herself by con- 
cealment. He mounted, but without a whip, and for want of one 
could not get the old horse out of a trot. This delay brought 
the Indians upon him again directly, and as soon as they were 
near enough they fired — and this time with more eff"ect, as one of 
the balls struck him in the hip and lodged in his groin. But this 
saved his life ; it frightened the horse into a gallop, and he escaped, 
although he sufi'ered severely for several months afterward. 

The Indians were afterward pursued, and surprised at their 
morning meal ; and, when fired on, four of them Avere killed, but 
the other, though wounded, made his escape. Bridges, who was 
taken prisoner near Johnstown when Adams was murdcrcl, saw 
him come to his people, and describes him as having been shot 
through the chest, with leaves stuffed in the bullet-holes to stop 
the bleeding. 

/ The first white child born in Eaystown was WilUam 

Frazer. When the Revolution broke out, Bedford county 

furnished two companies, a greater portion of one of the 

'O companies being recruited in what now constitutes Hunt- 

^ mgdon and Blair counties. Among these were a man 

{ y named McDonald, another named Fee, from the mouth 

S of Eaystown Branch, and George Weston, a brother of the 

^f^ tory shot at Kittaning, and a man named Cluggage. 



174 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

The town of Bedford was for a long time the residence 
of General A. St. Clair and a number of others who sub- 
sequently figured prominently in the affairs of the nation. 
For pure patriotism and a willingness to spend their blood 
and treasure for the cause of liberty, as well as the defence 
of their brethren on the confines of the county, few towns 
could excel Bedford, which reflected such credit upon them 
as will be remembered by the grateful descendants of the 
frontier-men when history fails to do them justice. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 175 



CHAPTER XIII. 

RAYSTOWN BRANCH, CONTINUED — MURDER OF SANDERS AND HIS FAMILY 

ENGLISHMAN AND WIFE TAKEN PRISONERS — FELIX SKELLY AND 

MRS. ELDER TAKEN CAPTIVES — THEIR RETURN, ETC. 

The country between the mouth of the Raystown 
Branch of the Juniata and what is called the Crossings 
was thinly settled prior to the Revolution. The land, and 
general appearance of tilings, did not strike settlers very 
favorably; hence it may be assumed that it was only 
taken up about 1772, when the new-comers from the 
eastern counties had already taken up the choice tracts 
lying contiguous to the river. 

The first depredation committed on the Branch, near its 
mouth, by the savages, occurred in May, 1780. A band 
of roving Indians were known to be in the country, as 
several robberies had occurred in Hartslog Valley, at 
houses belonging to men who with their families were 
forted either at Ly tie's or at Huntingdon. A scout had 
ranged the entire frontier in search of these depredators, 
but could not find them. They were seen in Woodcock 
Valley, and information immediately conveyed to the 
commander at the fort in Huntingdon. A scout was sent 
to Woodcock Valley, but got upon the wrong trail, as the 



176 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Indians had crossed the Terrace Mountain, where, it ap- 
pears, they divided into two parties. One of them went 
to the house of one Sanders, on the Branch; and just as 
the family were seating themselves at the table to eat 
dinner, five of the savages bounded in, and killed Sanders, 
his wife, and three children. An Englishman and his 
wife, whose names are not recollected, were in the house at 
the time, both of whom begged for their lives, declared 
they were loyal to the king, and would accompany them. 
The Indians agreed to take them along as prisoners, not- 
withstanding at that period scaljDS commanded nearly as 
high a price as prisoners. The Englishman and his wife 
were taken to Montreal. 

The day following the above massacre, the other party 
of savages, who it appears had taken the country nearer 
the Juniata to range through, made their ajDpearance at 
the house of a Mrs. Skelly, who was sick in bed at the 
time, and her nearest neighbor, Mrs. Elder, being there on 
a visit. It was a beautiful May-day Sabbath afternoon, 
when Mrs. Elder prepared to go home, and Felix Skelly, 
the son, agreed to accompany her part of the way. They 
had gone probably a hundred rods through a meadow, 
when Mrs. Elder noticed a savage, partly concealed behind 
some elder-bushes. She stopped suddenly, and told Felix, 
who had got a little in advance, to return, as there were 
Indians about. Skelly said he thought not, and advised 
her to come on, or it would be night before he could re- 
turn. Mrs. Elder stood still, however, and soon saw the 
figure of the Indian so plainly as not to be mistaken, when 
she screamed to Felix to run, and, when in the act of turn- 
ing around, a savage sprang from behind an elder bush 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 177 

into the path, and seized her by the hair. Another seized 
Skelly, and in a moment the shout of victory went np, 
and three or four more Indians came from their places of 
concealment. Finding themselves captives, and unable 
to remedy matters, they submitted with a good grace. 

Fortunately for them, the warrior who had command 
of the party could speak a little English, and was a little 
more humane than the generality of savages of the day. 
He gave Mrs. Elder positive assurance that no harm 
should befall her. He would not, however, give the same 
assurance to Skelly. They took up their line of march 
over the Terrace Mountain, crossed over to the base of the 
Alleghany, avoiding as much as possible the white settle- 
ments, and crossed the mountain by the Kittaning Path. 

Skelly, although but seventeen years of age, was an 
atheletic fellow, well built, and weighed in the neighbor- 
hood of one hundred and eighty pounds. The Indians, 
noticing his apparent strength, and in order probably to 
tire him so that he would make no effort to escape, loaded 
him down with the plunder they had taken in Hartslog 
Valley. In addition to this, they found on the Alleghany 
Mountains some excellent wood for making bows and ar- 
rows, a quantity of which they cut and bound together, 
and compelled Skelly to carry. Mrs. Elder was obliged 
to carry a long-handled frying-pan, which had been 
brought all the way from Germany by a Dunkard 
family, and had, in all probability, done service to three 
or four generations. Of course, Mrs. Elder, burdened 
with this alone, made no complaint. 

At length the party reached an Indian town on the 

Alleghany River, where it was determined that a halt 

12 



178 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLEY. 

should take pla.ce in order to recruit. One of the Indians 
was sent forward to apprise the town of their coming; 
and on their entering the town they found a large num- 
ber of savages drawn up in two lines about six feet 
apart, all armed with clubs or paddles. Skelly was re- 
lieved of his load and informed that the performance 
would open b}^ his being compelled to run the gauntlet. 
Skelly, like a man without money at one o'clock who has 
a note to meet in bank before three, felt the imjDortance 
and value of time; so, walking leisurely between the 
lines, he bounded off at a speed that would have done 
credit to a greyhound, and reached the far end without 
receiving more than one or two light blows. He was 
then exempt, as no prisoner was compelled to undergo 
the same punisliment twice. 

The Indians, disappointed by the fleetness of Skelly, 
expected to more than make up for it in pummelling Mrs. 
Elder; but in this they reckoned without their host. The 
word wa^ given for her to start, but the warrior who had 
captured her demurred, and not from disinterested motives, 
either, as will presently appear. His objections were over- 
ruled, and it was plainly intimated that she must con- 
form to the custom. Seeing no method of avoiding it, 
Mrs. Elder, armed with the long-handled pan, walked 
between the lines with a determined look. The first 
savage stooped to strike her, and in doing so his scant 
dress exposed his person, which Mrs. Elder saw, and 
anticipated his intention by dealing him a blow on the 
exposed part which sent him sprawling upon all-fours. 
The chiefs who were looking on laughed immoderately, 
and the next four or five, intimidated by her heroism, did 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 179 

not attempt to raise their clubs. Another of them, de- 
termined to have a Httle fun, raised his club; but no 
sooner had he it fairly poised than she struck him upon 
the head with the frying-pan in such a manner as in all 
likelihood made him see more stars than ever lit the 
" welkin dome." The Indians considered her an Amazon, 
and she passed through the lines without further molesta- 
tion; but, as she afterward said, she "did it in a hurry." 

The squaws, as soon as she was released, commenced 
pelting her with sand, pulling her hair, and offering her 
other indignities, which she would not put up with, and 
again had recourse to her formidable weapon — the long- 
handled pan. Lustily she plied it, right and left, until 
the squaws were right glad to get out of her reach. 

In a day or two the line of march for Detroit was re- 
sumed, and for many weary days they plodded on their 
way. After the first day's journey, the warrior who had 
captured Mrs. Elder commenced making love to her. 
Her comely person had smitten him ; her courage had 
absolutely fascinated him, and he commenced wooing her 
in the most gentle manner. She had good sense enough 
to appear to lend a willing ear to his plaintive outpour- 
ings, and even went so far as to intimate that she would 
become his squaw on their arrival at Detroit. This music 
was of that kind which in reality had "charms to soothe 
the savage," and matters progressed finely. 

One night they encamped at a small Indian village on 
the bank of a stream in Ohio. Near the town was an old 
deserted mill, in the upper story of which Skelly and 
the rest of the male prisoners were placed and the door 
bolted. That evening the Indians had a grand dance 



180 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

and a drunken revel, which lasted until after midnight. 
When the revel ended, Skelly said to his comrades in 
captivity that he meant to escape if possible. He argued 
that if taken in the attempt he could only be killed, and 
he thought a cruel death by the savages would be his fate, 
at all events, at the end of the journey. They all com- 
menced searching for some means of egress, but none 
offered, save a window. The sash was removed, when, on 
looking out into the clear moonlight, to their horror they 
discovered that they were immediately over a large body 
of water, which formed the mill-dam, the distance to it 
being not less than sixty feet. They all started back but 
Skell}^ He, it appears, had set his heart upon a deter- 
mined effort to escape, and he stood for a while gazing 
upon the water beneath him. Every thing was quiet j 
not a breath of air was stirring. The sheet of water lay 
like a largo mirror, reflecting the pale rays of the moon. 
In a minute Skelly formed the desperate determination 
of jumping out of the mill-window. 

"Boys," whispered he, "I am going to jumj). The 
chances are against me; I may be killed by the fall, 
recaptured b}^ the savages and killed, or starve before I 
reach a human habitation ; but then I may escafpe, and, if 
I do, I will see my poor mother, if she is still alive, in 
less than ten days. AVith me, it is freedom from this cap- 
tivity noio, or death." So saying, he sprang from the 
window-sill, and, before the affrighted prisoners had time 
to shrink, they heard the heavy plunge of Skelly into 
the mill-dam. They hastened to the window, and in an 
instant saw him emerge from the water unharmed, shake 
himself like a spaniel, and disappear in the shadow of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 181 

some tall trees. The wary savage sentinels, a few 
minutes after the plunge, came down to ascertain the 
noise, but Skelly had already escaped. They looked 
up at the window, concluded that the prisoners had 
amused themselves by throwing something out, and 
returned to their posts. 

The sufferings of Skelly were probably among the most 
extraordinary ever endured by any mortal man. He sup- 
posed that he must have walked at least forty miles before 
he stopped to rest. He was in a dense forest, and without 
food. The morning was hazy, and the sun did not make 
its appearance until about ten o'clock, when, to his dis- 
may, he found he was bearing nearly due south, which 
would lead him right into the heart of a hostile savage 
country. After resting a short time, he again started on 
his way, shaping his course by the sun northeast, avoiding 
all places which bore any resemblance to an Indian trail. 
That night was one that he vividly remembered the 
balance of his life. As soon as it was dark, the cowardly 
wolves that kept out of sight during the day commenced 
howling, and soon got upon his track. The fearful prox- 
imity of the ravenous beasts, and he without even so 
much as a knife to defend himself, drove him almost to 
despair, when he discovered a sort of cave formed by a 
projecting rock. This evidently was a wolf's den. The 
hole was quite small, but he forced his body through it, 
and closed the aperture by rolling a heavy stone against 
it. Soon the wolves came, and the hungry pack, like a 
grand chorus of demons, kept up their infernal noise all 
night. To add to the horrors of his situation, he began 
to feel the pangs of both hunger and thirst. With the 



182 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

break of day came relief, for his cowardly assailants fled at 
dawn. He ventured out of the den, and soon resolved to 
keep on the lowlands. After digging up some roots, which 
he ate, and refreshing himself at a rivulet, he travelled on 
until after nightfall, when he came upon the very edge of 
a j)recipice, took a step, and fell among five Indians sitting 
around the embers of a fire. Uninjured by the fall, he 
sprang to his feet, bounded off in the darkness before the 
Indians could recover from their surprise, and made good 
his escape. 

In this way he travelled on, enduring the most excru- 
ciating pains from hunger and fatigue, until the fourth 
day, when he struck the Alleghany River in sight of Fort 
Pitt; at which place he recruited for a week, and then re- 
turned home by way of Bedford, in company with a body 
of troops marching east. 

His return created unusual gladness and great re- 
joicing, for his immediate friends mourned him as one 
dead. 

Mrs. Elder gave a very interesting narrative on her 
return, although she did not share in the sufferings of 
Skelly. She was taken to Detroit, where she lived in 
the British garrison in the capacity of a cook. From 
there she was taken to Montreal and exchanged, and 
reached home by way of Philadelphia. 

Felix Skelly afterward moved to the neighborhood 
of Wilmore, in Cambria county, where he lived a long 
time, and died full of years and honors. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 183 



CHAPTER XIV. 

STANDING STONE, ANCIENT AND MODERN — MURDER OF FELIX 
DONNELLY AND IlIS SON FRANCIS, ETC. 

As an Indian post of ancient date, none is more univer- 
sally known than "Standing Stone," where Huntingdon 
now stands. The very earliest traders could never ascer- 
tain by Indian tradition how long it had been a village, 
but that it dated back to a very remote period may be 
judged from the fact that the land on the flat between 
Stone Creek and Huntingdon was under cultivation one 
hundred and five years ago. It was used as one exten- 
sive corn-field, with the exception of that portion lying 
near the mouth of the creek, where the Indian town 
stood, and where also was a public ground, used on great 
occasions for councils or dances. 

The Standing Stone — that is, the original stone — was, 
according to John Harris, fourteen feet high and six 
inches square. It stood on the right bank of Stone 
Creek, near its mouth, and in such a position as to 
enable persons to see it at a considerable distance, either 
from up or down the river. 

About this self-same Standing Stone there still exist 
contradictory opinions. These we have endeavored to 
ascertain; and, after weighing them carefully, we have 
come to the conclusion that no person now living ever 



184 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

saw part or parcel of the original stone, notwtlistancling 
Dr. Henderson delivered what some are disposed to 
believe a portion of it to the Historical Society of 
Pennsylvania. 

The original Standing Stone, we are induced to believe, 
in addition to serving a similar capacity to that of a guide- 
board at a cross-road, was the official record of the tribe. 
On it, no doubt, were engraved all the important epochs 
in its history, — its wars, its mighty deeds, its prowess in 
battle, and its skill in the chase. It might, too, have served 
as a sacred tablet to the memory of many a noble chief 
who fell by the arrow of an enemy. These things were, 
no doubt, in cabahstic characters; and, although each 
inscription may have been small, its meaning may have 
taken in almost an unbounded scope, as Indian brevity 
generally does. 

Tills stone waKS once the cause of a war. The Tusca- 
roras, residing some thirty or forty miles down the river, — 
probably in Tuscarora Valley, — wished to declare war 
against the tribe at Standing Stone, for some real or 
fancied insult, and for this purpose sent them repeated 
war-messages, which the tribe at the Stone refused to 
give ear to, knowing as they did the strength and power 
of the enemy. Taking advantage of the absence of a 
large part of the tribe on a hunt, the Tuscaroras, in great 
force, came upon the village, captured the stone, and 
carried it off. Immediately after the return of the 
warriors, the entire available war-force was despatched 
after the depredators, 'who were soon overtaken. A 
bloody conflict ensued, and the trophy was recaptured 
and carried back in triumph. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 185 

Dr. Barton, it is said, discovered that the word Oneida 
meant " Standing Stone," in the language of the South- 
ern Indians. ■•=' The Oneida tribe of the Iroquois had 
a tradition that their forefathers came from the South ; 
consequently, the tribe at Standing Stone may have been 
part of the Oneida tribe instead of Delawares, as was 
generally supposed. The Tuscaroras, according to history, 
came from the South and became one of the Iroquois con- 
federation in 1712. The language of the two tribes in 
question, although not identical, bore a strong affinity to 
each other. Hence we may surmise that the characters 
upon the stone were understood by the Tuscaroras, and 
that it possessed, in their eyes, sufficient value to move it 
some forty or fifty miles, under what we should call dis- 
advantageous circumstances, especially when it is known 
that stones of a better finish could have been found any- 
where along the Juniata River. 

There is no doubt at all but what the original stone 
was removed by the Indians and taken with them in 
1754 or 1755, for it is a well-ascertained fact that the 
Indians in the valley, with some few exceptions, (Augli- 
wick, for instance,) joined the French in the above years. 

The first survey of the land on which Huntingdon now 
stands was made by Mr. Lukens, in behalf of a claimant 
named Crawford, in 1 756. It is therein named as " George 
Crogan's improvement." It is not improbable that Crogan 
may have claimed the improved fields and site of the de- 
serted village, but that he ever made any improvement 



* Morgan, iu his "League of the Iroquois," gives it a different inter- 
pretation. 



186 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

beyond probably erecting a trading-post there is a matter 
of some doubt. His whole history proves that he was no 
improving man. 

On the second stone erected were found the names of 
John and Charles Lukens, Thomas Smith, and a number 
of others, with dates varying from 1768 to 1770, cut or 
chiselled. This stone was most unquestionably erected, by 
some of the men whose names it bore, on the same spot 
where the original stone stood, but was subsequently re- 
moved to or near Avhere the old court-house in Hunting- 
don formerly stood. This position it occupied for many 
years, and might still stand as a monument of the past, 
had not some Vandal taken it into his head to destroy it. 
One piece of it still remains in a wall of the foundation 
of a house in Huntingdon. 

The old Indian graveyard (and an extensive one it 
must have been) was on the high ground, near where the 
present Presbyterian church stands. To the credit of the 
Huntingdon folks be it said, they have never permitted a 
general exhumation of the bones of the Indians, to fill 
scientific cabinets, gratify the morbid appetites of the 
curious, or even to satisfy the less objectionable zeal 
of the antiquarian. 

The few white settlers who lived at the Stone, in 1762, 
partially erected a stockade fort; but before the spring of 
1763 they were forced to abandon it, as well as their 
houses, and fly to Carlisle for protection. When the set- 
tlers returned, in 1770, the fort still stood, though par- 
tially decayed. Immediately on the breaking out of the 
war of the Revolution, the fort was rebuilt on a more 
extended scale by the few inhabitants of the town and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 187 

surrounding country. It was located near where the 
court-house now stands, immediately on the bluff, and, 
according to the traces of it discovered by the present 
generation, must have covered ten acres of ground. It 
was strongly built; and, when the savages were in the 
midst of their depredations, it was the only reliable 
refuge — before the erection of the Lead Mine Fort, in 
Sinking Valley — for all the people residing as far west as 
the base of the Alleghany Mountains. 

No actual attempt was ever made against Standing 
Stone Fort ; neither were there ever any Indians seen, ex- 
cept on two or three occasions, very close to it. A party 
of lurking savages were once surprised and shot at by 
a number of scouts on the hill where the graveyard now 
stands; but they made good their escape Avithout any 
injury being done. 

At another time, by a display of cool courage, as well 
as shrewdness, that would do any general credit, the 
commander of the fort unquestionably saved the place 
from total annihilation. One morning a large body of 
savages apjDcared upon the ridge on the opposite side of 
the river, and, by their manoeuvring, it was clearly evi- 
dent that they meditated an attack, which, under the 
circumstances, must have proved disastrous to the set- 
tlers, for not more than ten men able to bear arms were 
in the fort at the time — the majority having left on a 
scouting expedition. The commander, with judgment 
that did him infinite credit, marshalled his men, and 
paraded them for half an hour in such a manner as to 
enable the Indians to see a constant moving of the middle 
of the column, but neither end of it, while the drums kept 



188 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

up a constant clatter. In addition to this, lie ordered all 
the women out, armed them with frying-pans, brooms, or 
whatever he could lay his hands upon, and marched 
them about the enclosure after the same manner in which 
he did the men. The enemy could only make out the 
dim outlines of the people and hear the noise. The 
stratagem succeeded, and, after a very short council of 
war, the Indians disappeared. 

Among those who fignred about Standing Stone, at the 
beginning of the Revolution, were the Bradys. Hugh 
Brady's name appears in some of the old title-deeds; and 
the father of Sam. Brady (rendered famous by R. B. 
McCabe, Esq.) lived at the mouth of the little run oppo- 
site Huntingdon. Within the walls of Standing Stone 
Fort, General Hugh Brady and a twin-sister were born. 
All the Bradys went to the West Branch of the Susque- 
hanna during the Revolution. Hugh entered the army 
at an early age, and, step by step, rose from the ranks to 
the exalted position he occupied at the time of his death. 
A characteristic anecdote is related of him. At one time 
he was lying ill at Erie, and his physician told him he 
could not survive. "Let the drams beat," said he; 
"my knapsack is swung, and Hugh Brady is ready to 
march!" He recovered, however, and died only a few 
years ago, at Sunbury. 

The only massacre by Indians in the immediate vicinity 
of Standing Stone occurred on the 19th of June, 1777, at 
what was then known as the " Big Spring," two miles 
west of the fort. In consequence of hostile bands of 
Indians having been seen at a number of places in the 
neighborhood, and the general alarm which followed, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 189 

people commenced flocking to the forts from every direc- 
tion. 

On the day above named, Felix Donnelly and his son 
Francis, and Bartholomew Maguire and his daughter, 
residing a short distance from the mouth of Shaver's 
Creek, placed a number of their movable effects upon 
horses, and, with a cow, went down the river, for the 
purpose of forting at Standing Stone. Jane Maguire was 
in advance, driving the cow, and the Donnellys and 
Maguire in the rear, on the horses. When nearly oppo- 
site the Big Spring, an Indian fired from ambuscade and 
killed young Donnelly. His father, who was close to 
him, caught him, for the purpose of keeping him upon 
the horse. Maguire urged the old man to fly, but he re- 
fused to leave his son. Maguire then rode to his side, 
and the two held the dead body of Francis. While in 
this position, three Indians rushed from their ambuscades 
with terrific yells, and fired a volley, one bullet striking 
Felix Donnelly, and the other grazing Maguire's ear, 
carrying away a portion of his hair. The bodies of both 
the Donnellys fell to the ground, and Maguire rode for- 
ward, passing (probably without noticing her) his daugh- 
ter. The Indians, after scalping the murdered men, 
followed Jane, evidently with the intention of making a 
prisoner of her. The fleetest of them overtook her, and 
grasped her by the dress, and with uplifted tomahawk 
demanded her to surrender; but she struggled heroically. 
The strings of her short-gown gave way, and by an ex- 
traordinary effort she freed herself, leaving the garment 
in the hand of the savage; then, seizing the cow's tail, 
she gave it a twist, which started the animal running, and 



190 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

gave her an impetus which soon enabled her to pass her 
father. The savage still followed, but in the mean time 
Maguire had recovered from the consternation caused by 
the massacre, and immediately aimed his rifle at the 
Indian, when the latter took shelter behind a tree. At 
this juncture, a number of men who were pitching quoits 
at Cryder's Mill, on the ojDposite side of the river, who 
had heard the firing and the whoops of the savages, put 
off in a canoe to engage the Indians ; but they were soon 
discovered, and the Indian, shaking Jane Maguire's short- 
gown derisively at them, disappeared. The men, doubt- 
ful as to the number of the enemy, returned to the mill, 
to await the arrival of a 2;reater force. 



&' 



Maguire and his daughter reached the fort in a state 
better imagined than described. The garrison was soon 
alarmed, and a number of armed men started in jDursuit 
of the savages. At the mill they were joined by the men 
previously mentioned; and, although every exertion was 
made in their power, they could not get upon their trail, 
and the pursuit was abandoned. 

The dead bodies of the Donnellys were taken to Stand- 
ing Stone, and buried uj)on what was then vacant ground ; 
but the spot where they now rest is pointed out in a 
garden in the heart of the borough of Huntingdon. 

Jane Maguire, who certainly exhibited a very fair share 
of the heroism of the day in her escape from the savage, 
afterward married a man named Dowling, and moved to 
Raystown Branch, where she reared a family of children, 
some of whom are still living. 

Oj^posite the mouth of the Raystown Branch lived 
Colonel Fee, an active and energetic man during the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 191 

Revolution. He was in Captain Blair's expedition against 
the tories, and for a while served as a private in the army. 
His widow (a sister of the late Thomas Jackson, of Gays- 
port) is still living, at the advanced age of eighty-seven 
years, and to her we are indebted for much valuable in- 
formation in the construction of these pages. 

The Cryders, too, are worthy of a special notice. They 
consisted of a father, mother, and seven sons. They 
built a mill at the Big Spring, which served for the people 
of Standing Stone and the surrounding country. They 
were all men suitable for the times — rugged and daring. 
A majority of them were constantly in service during the 
war of the Revolution, either as frontier-men, scouts, or 
fort guards. Michael Cryder, the father, used to spend his 
days at his mill and his nights at the fort during the 
troublesome times, and it was himself and five of his sons 
who accomplished the then extraordinary achievement of 
running the first ark-load of flour down the Juniata 
River. 

The Standing Stone is frequently mentioned in the 
Archives, but its name is mostly coupled with rumors, 
grossly exaggerated, of attacks by tories, &c. There is no 
doubt whatever but that great distress, principally 
arising from a want of provisions, prevailed there during 
the war. 

When the alarms were most frequent, and Council had 
been importuned time and again to send provisions to 
Standing Stone, as well as men for its defence, and muni- 
tions, a circular was issued to the county lieutenants, 
dated July 16, 1778, from which we extract the fol- 
lowing : — 



192 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

It is proper to acquaint you that Colonel Broadliead's regiment, 
now on a march to Pittsburg, is ordered by the Board of War to 
the Standing Stone ; and we have ordered three hundred militia 
from Cumberland, and two hundred from York, to join them. 

This jDromise to the ear of the affrighted settlers was 
broken to the hope. Only seventy of the Cumberland 
militia were taken to the Standing Stone, and thirty of 
them soon after removed to garrison the Lead Mine 
Fort. 

Huntingdon was laid out previous to the commence- 
ment of hostilities — probably in 1775, — but it retained the 
name of Stone Town for many years. With the exception 
of Frankstown, it is the oldest town on the Juniata. On 
the formation of the county, in 1787, it took the same 
name. The county, during the late war with Great 
Britain, furnished three full companies; and, although it 
once was the stronghold of tories, w^e can now safely say 
that it stands among the most patriotic in the State. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 193 



CHAPTER XV. 

TRIALS OF THE EARLY SETTLERS — THEIR FORTS, AND OTHER MEANS 

OF DEFENCE. 

The first outbreak of the war in 1775 found the 
frontier inhabitants few in number and without arms. 
Living in a remote part of the State, where no invading 
foe would be likely to come, many young and vigorous 
men went forward and joined the army. This fancied 
security, however, proved a sad delusion to the frontier- 
men; and the absence of any regular means of defence 
was only severely felt when the savages came down from 
the mountain, ripe for raj)ine, blood, and theft. The fact 
that the northwestern savages had allied themselves to the 
English was only fully realized by the residents of the 
Juniata Valley when the painted warriors came down 
the Kittaning War Path, and commenced their infernal 
and atrocious work by scalping women and innocent 
babes. 

The first alarm and panic over, people collected to- 
gether and consulted about some means of defence. The 
more prudent were in favor of abandoning their farms and 
retiring to some of the eastern settlements, which many 
did, especially after it was discovered that so many of the 

13 



194 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

king's subjects were likely to remain loyal instead of 
joining the cause of the patriots. The more daring would 
not agree to abandon their homes, but at once pledged 
themselves to defend their firesides at the risk of their 
lives. 

To this end, in the fall of 1777, and in the spring of 
1778, a number of fortifications were commenced, the 
farms abandoned, or partially so, and the inhabitants 
assumed an attitude of defence. These forts were gene- 
rally stockades, built of logs or puncheons, with loop- 
holes made to flare on the outside, in order to bring 
rifles to bear in several directions. 

The first of these forts was built near where McCahen's 
Mill now stands, which was called Fetter's or Frankstown, 
about a mile above Hollidaysburg. A barn on the flat 
opposite the second lock, a mile below Hollidaysburg, 
was turned into a fort and called Holliday's. It was an 
old barn, but very large, and belonged to one Peter Titus. 
Through the energy of Mr. Holliday and a few others, it 
was made comfortable, but not deemed very secure. 
These forts served for the families in what was termed 
the Frankstown district, comprising not only Frankstown, 
but all the surrounding country. In Canoe Valley a fort 
was built, called Lowry's Fort, but it was small and 
inconvenient; and the house of Matthew Dean, a mile 
farther up, was also turned into a temporary fortress in 
1777. These served the people of Canoe Valley and 
Water Street. The people of Hartslog Valley erected 
a fort south of Alexandria, on Cannon's mill-run, called 
Lytle's. A large and substantial garrison, called Hart- 
sock's Fort, was built in Woodcock Valley, which served 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 195 

for the people of that valley and also for the residents of 
the middle of the Cove. The inhabitants of the lower 
end of the Cove, and along Clover Creek, forted at the 
house of Captain Phillips, some two or three miles above 
where Williamsburg now stands, which was turned into 
a temporary fortress. Anderson's Fort was erected where 
Petersburg now stands, while along Shaver's Creek there 
were two others — one at General McElery's, and the other 
at Alexander McCormick's, toward Stone Creek. The 
latter was merely a house fortified without additional 
buildings, as was also the house of Captain E. Rickets, in 
Warrior's Mark. Forts were also built at Dunning's 
Creek, and on the Raystown Branch, while the forts at 
Standing Stone and Bedford were enlarged and improved. 
The year following, a very substantial fort was built at 
the residence of Jacob Roller, in Sinking Valley, to ac- 
commodate the large influx of people into the valley. 
In the fall of 1778, Fort Roberdeau, or as it was better 
known, the Lead Mine Fort, in Sinking Valley, was com- 
pleted. It was the largest as well as the best-defended 
post on the frontier. It was built under the superinten- 
dence of General Roberdeau, and occupied by Major 
Cluggage, with a regular company from Cumberland 
county. On the ramparts two cannon were mounted, 
and in the fortress there were plenty of small-arms 
and ammunition. This fort was strengthened by go- 
vernment. Lead was exceedingly scarce, and a high 
value was attached to it; and, fearing that the mines 
might fall into the hands of the enemy, the most vigi- 
lant watch was kept and the most rigid military disci- 
pline enforced. 



196 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

During the summer of 1776, very few depredations 
were committed ; but in the following year, as succeeding 
chapters will show, the incursions and massacres of the 
Indians were so bold and cruel that the utmost con- 
sternation prevailed, and business was in a great mea- 
sure suspended. The settlers managed to get their 
sowing done in both fall and spring, but much was 
sowed that never was reaped. To add to their de- 
plorable condition, the horrors of starvation were con- 
stantly staring them in the face. 

In order to get in crops, it was necessary to have 
the reapers guarded and sentinels posted at each corner 
of a field, while half-grown boys followed in the very 
footsteps of the laborers, carrying their rifles loaded 
and primed for defence. By such means they managed 
to get a scant supply of grain. 

The cattle were suffered to graze at large, for seldom, 
if ever, any of them were molested. Hogs, too, were 
suffered to run at large in the woods, feeding upon roots 
and acorns. When meat was wanted, a party ran down 
a hog or heifer, butchered it, and took it to the fort. As 
for such luxuries as coffee, tea, sugar, &c., they were 
among the missing, and little cared for. 

It is not, we hope, to the discredit of any of the best 
men in the Juniata Valley now, to say that their fathers 
were born in forts and rocked in sugar-troughs, and their 
grandfathers wore entire suits, including shoes, made of 
buckskin, lived sometimes on poor fare, and short allow- 
ance at that. They were the men whose sinewy arms 
hewed down the monarchs of the forest, and, with 
shovel, hoe, plough, and pick, that we might enjoy the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 197 

bounties of mother earth when they were mouldering in 
the bosom thereof, made "waste places glad" and the 
wilderness to blossom like the rose. Hallowed be their 
names ! But, while we raise the tuneful lay to sing psalms 
of praise to the glorious old pioneers who by hardship and 
toil have entailed such blessings upon us, is it not a 
melancholy reflection to think that in but a few succeed- 
ing generations the scanty pages of ancient histories alone 
will be the monuments to chronicle their deeds ? 



198 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

THE EARLY SETTLERS — OLD HART, THE INDIAN TRADER, ETC. 

We have been unable to procure any thing hke a full 
and complete list of the early settlers of the entire val- 
^^y j y^t we deem it necessary to give what we have pro- 
cured, as a necessary adjunct to our work. It will be 
perceived that many of the names are familiar, and the 
descendants are still scattered profusely over this section 
of the country, as well as the Union. 

Mr. Bell, in his Memoir, states that, at the time of his 
earliest recollection, between the Stone (Huntingdon) and 
the mountain, the pioneers had principally settled along 
the streams. The prevailing religion was the Presbyte- 
rian, although there were Lutherans and Roman Catho- 
lics, " and probably as many who professed no religion at 
all as all the other denominations put together." 

In addition to those whose names have already ap- 
peared, or Avill appear hereafter, we may incidentally 
mention, as early settlers about Lewistown, the McClays, 
McNitts, and Millikin; west of Lewistown, along the 
river, the Junkins, Wilsons, Bratton, and Stackpoles. 

At Huntingdon, Ludwig Sills, Benjamin Elliot, Abra- 
ham Haynes, Frank Cluggage, Mr. Allabaugh, and Mr. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 199 

McMurtrie; west of Huntingdon, in the neighborhood 
of Shaver's Creek, Samuel Anderson, Bartholomew Ma- 
guire, General McElevy, McCormick, and Donnelly. Of 
course, this place was settled at a later day than the 
country farther east. 

The first house erected where Alexandria now stands 
was located near a spring, and was built and occupied by 
two young Scotchmen, named Matthew Neal and Hugh 
Glover, as a kind of trading-post. They dealt in goods 
generally, and in whiskey particularly. The natural con- 
sequences of a free indulgence in the latter were fights 
innumerable, " even in them days," and the place re- 
ceived the euphonious title of " Battle Swamp," which 
clung to it for many years. Near that place, at what 
was called " Charles's Fording of the Big Juniata," was 
the celebrated log which gave rise to the name of the 
valley. Charles Caldwell lived in the neighborhood — 
was the oldest settler, and the only one residing within 
two miles of " Battle Swamp." In what then constituted 
the valley — say in 1776 — lived John Tussey, Robert 
Caldwell, and Edward Rickets, on the banks of the Little 
Juniata. On the main stream, or what was then termed 
the Frankstown Branch, on the northwest side, resided 
John_^ell, William Travis, James Dean, Moses Donald- 
son, and Thomas Johnston. On the southwest bank 
resided John Mitchell and Peter Grafius. George Jack- 
son lived on the banks of the Little Juniata, probably a 
mile from the mouth of Shaver's Creek; and a mile 
farther up lived Jacob and Josiah Minor. In the neigh- 
borhood of Water Street and Canoe Valley, John and 
Matthew Dean, Jacob Roller, John Bell, Lowry, Beattys, 



200 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Moreheads, Simonton, Vanzant, John Sanders, Samuel 
Davis, Edward Milligan. Near Frankstown, and in it, 
Lazarus Lowry, the Moores, Alexander McDowell. West 
of Frankstown, Josej^h McCune, Mclntyre, John McKillip, 
McRoberts, and John Grouse. Most of the latter lived 
along where the Reservoir now is — the building of which 
destroyed the old McCune and McRoberts farms. On 
the flat, west of Frankstown, lived Peter Titus and John 
Carr; in the Loop, A. Robinson and W. Divinny; John 
Long, near where Jackson's farm now is ; Foster, where 
McCahen's Mill now stands ; and a little distance farther 
west, David Bard, a Presbyterian preacher; Thomas and 
Michael Coleman, Michael Wallack, James Hardin, a Mr. 
Hileman, and David Torrence, in the neighborhood of where 
Altoona now stands. Of course, this list does not comprise 
all the old settlers, nor probably even a majority of them, 
but we copy a portion of the names from Mr. Bell's Memoir. 
A number of them were given to us by Maguire, and some 
were found in an old ledger, belonging to Lazarus Lowry 
when he kept store in Frankstown in 1790. 

The man Hart, whose name is perpetuated, in con- 
nection with his log, by the valley we have spoken of, 
was an old German, who followed the occupation of 
trading among the Indians. He was probably the first 
permanent white settler along the Juniata west of the 
Standing Stone; and, long before he settled, he crossed 
and recrossed the Alleghany Mountains, by the old war- 
path, with his pack-horses. "John Hart's Sleeping 
Place" is mentioned, in 1756, by John Harris, in making 
an estimate of the distance between the rivers Susque- 
hanna and Alleghany. Hart's Sleeping Place is about 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 201 

twelve miles from the junction of the Burgoon and Kit- 
taning Runs, and still retains its name. When he took 
up his residence along the river, he hewed down an im- 
mense tree, and turned it into a trough, out of which 
he fed his horses and cattle; hence the name, "Hart's 
Log." 

It is stated that upon one occasion, when Hart was an 
old man, some savages came into his settlement on a 
pillaging excursion. They knew Hart, and went to his 
cabin, but he happened to be from home. On his log 
they left a tomahawk, painted red, and a small piece of 
slate upon which rude hieroglyphics were drawn — one 
resembling an Indian with a bundle upon his back, over 
whose head were seven strokes and whose belt was filled 
with scalps. In front of this drawing was the sun rising, 
and beliind them a picture of the moon. 

On Hart's return, he soon found that Indians had been 
about. The meaning of the articles left he could readily 
decipher. The red hatchet upon the log signified that 
Indians were about, but to him they laid down the hatchet. 
The picture of the rising sun sigTiified that they were 
going to the east. The strokes indicated the number of 
warriors, and the bundle and scalps intimated that they 
would both plunder and murder. The moon signified 
that they would return at night. 

Hart, although he felt safe under such an assurance, 
had no desire to encounter the red-skins; so he scratched 
upon the reverse of the slate the outline of a heart, and 
laid by the side of it a pipe — which, interpreted, meant, 
" Hart smokes with you the pipe of peace," and left. 

On his return next day he found the Indians had re- 



i^ 



202 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

turned, and passed the night at his log, where they had 
left a quantity of pewter platters, mugs, &c. It after- 
ward appeared that they had been at several houses, but 
the inmates had fled. From one they stole a quantity of 
silver money, and at the house of a Dunkard they stole 
the pewter-ware. At the log they attempted to run the 
metal into bullets, but, finding it a failure, they probably 
left the heavy load in disgust. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 203 



CHAPTER XVII. 

THE CONTINENTAL MILLS OP THE VALLEY. 

Among the vicissitudes incident to the settlement of the 
valley was a very serious one, in the shape of sometimes 
an absolute want of flour — not always owing to a lack of 
grain, but the want of mills. Especially did this operate 
seriously during the Revolution. The few mills at such 
great distances apart rendered it necessary for parties of 
neighbors to join in company, arm themselves, and go to 
mill together — all waiting until the grain was turned into 
flour. The want of adequate machinery prevented the 
erection of mills, and those that were built prior to the 
Revolution, and during the continuance of the war, could 
scarcely, do the requisite amount of work for the country, 
sparsely as it was settled. To look at some of the old 
gearing and machinery in use then would only confirm 
the adage that " necessity is the mother of invention." 

The late Edward Bell, of Blair county, who rose to 
competence by his own indomitable energy and perseve- 
rance, and commanded the esteem and respect of all who 
knew him, once boasted to us that the first shoes he ever 
wore he made for himself in Fort Lowry. 



204 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

" And," said he, " I made them so well that T soon be- 
came shoemaker to the fort. There is no doubt but that 
I could have followed the business to advantage; but I 
never liked it, so I served a regular apprenticeship to the 
millwrighting." 

It is to this circumstance, then, that we are indebted 
for the following unique description of the old continental 
mill, which still stands at J. Green & Company's (for- 
merly Dorsey's) forge, on the Little Juniata, in Hunt- 
ingdon county. It was built before the Revolution, — as 
near as can be ascertained, in 1774, — by Jacob and Josiah 
Minor. Mr. Bell, in his manuscript, says : — 

It was a curious piece of machinery -when I first saw it. The 
house was about twelve feet high, and about fourteen feet square, 
made of small poles and covered with clapboards. There was 
neither floor nor loft in it. The husk was made of round logs 
built into the wall; the water or tub wheel was some three feet 
in diameter, and split boards driven into the sides of the shaft 
made the buckets. The shaft had a gudgeon in the lower end and 
a thing they called a spindle in the upper end, and was not dressed 
in any way between the claws. The stones were about two feet 
four or six inches in diameter, and not thick, and in place of a 
hoop they had cut a buttonwood-tree that was hollow and large 
enough to admit the stones, and sawed or cut it off to make the 
hoop. The hopper was made of clapboards, and a hole near the 
eye of the stone answered for the dampsil, with a pin driven in it, 
which struck the shoe every time the stone revolved. The meal- 
trough, made out of part of a gun, completed the grinding fix- 
tures. The bolting-chest was about six feet long, two and half feet 
wide, and four feet high, made of live-wood puncheons, split, hewed, 
and jointed to hold flour, with a pair of deer-skins sewed together 
to shut the door. There was not one ounce of iron about the chest 
or bolting-reel. It had a crank or handle on one end, made of 
wood — the shaft, ribs, and arms, of the same material ; and the cloth 
was leona muslin, or lining that looked like it. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 205 

Rather a one-horse concern for our day and generation ! 
and its capacity must have been about as one to one thou- 
sand, when compared with the mills of the present age. 
We should like to see how some of the people of the 
valley m/w would relish bread baked from flour bolted 
through Leona muslin! It might do for dyspepsia; in- 
deed, we doubt whether such a disease was known in the 
valley at so early a day. 

The mill of which Mr. Bell speaks, although it may 
have been the first in his neighborhood, was by no means 
the first driven by the waters of the Juniata. William 
Patterson erected a mill, where Millerstown now stands, 
as early as 1758, which, however, was carried off* by a 
flood a year or so after it was in operation. 

The first mill in the Upper Valley was built on Yellow 
Creek, by the squatters, previous to the edict of the Penn 
family which destroyed the cabins ; but in what year, or 
by whom built, or what its ultimate fate was, we are 
unable to say. 

The second mill in the valley was built where Spang's 
Mill now stands, in Blair county, then considered a part 
of the Cove. It was erected by a man named Jacob 
Neff", a Dunkard. This mill was burned down during 
the Revolution by the Indians, but speedily rebuilt, and 
stood for many years thereafter. 

The third was the " Tub" Mill, of which Mr. Bell 
gives a description. The term t%ih was applied to it in 
consequence of the peculiar formation of the water-wheel. 
Nearly all the mills of those days were worked with a 
tub-wheel. 

Directly after, a mill was erected by a Mr. Fetter, near 



206 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

where McCalien's Mill now stands, near Hollidaysburg. 
No traces whatever are left of it. 

About the same period, two brothers, named Beebault, 
built a mill, almost the counter^Dart of the Minor Mill, at 
the mouth of Spruce Creek. Relics of this mill stood 
until within a few years. 

The next was a small mill built by a man named 
Armitage, at Mill Creek, below Huntingdon. 

Nathaniel Garrard built one in Woodcock Valley, about 
six miles from Huntingdon. 

Another was built in the vicinity of Frankstown; 
another near where Martha Forge, in the Gap, now 
stands. 

Cryder's Mill, above Huntingdon, was finished about 
1776. 

These were all the mills that existed in the upper end 
of the valley prior to the Revolution. Although small, 
they were evidently of immense value — people having 
sometimes been compelled to travel some forty miles to 
obtain their services. The vestiges of all are gone, like 
shadows that have passed away, save the old Conti- 
nentaller described by Mr. Bell. It alone stands, a relic 
of the past. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 207 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

THE COVE EARLY SETTLEMENT BY DUNKARDS — INDIAN MASSACRES 

AND CAPTIVES — MASSACRE OF ULLERY — A RESISTANT DUN- 
KARD, ETC. 

" The Great Cove, Little Cove, and Canolloways," are 
mentioned frequently in government papers as far back 
as 1749, Indian traders having penetrated them at a 
much earlier date than that ; yet they only figure promi- 
nently from that period. The Great Cove, now known 
as Morrison's, commences at Pattonsville, in Bedford 
county, and ends at Williamsburg, on the Juniata — 
bounded by Dunning's and Lock Mountains on the west, 
and Tussey Mountain on the east. For fertile limestone 
land, beautiful scenery, and splendid farms, few valleys in 
the State equal — none surpass — Morrison's Cove. 

The earliest settlement of the cove was effected by 
Scotch-Irish, as early as 1749; but they shared the fate 
of the burnt-cabin folks when Secretary Peters answered 
the prayers of the Indians, and were expelled. Nothing 
daunted, however, many of them returned, and com- 
menced improving ; that, too, before the scions of 
'' Father Onus" had acquired the right, title, and interest, 
to all and singular these fine lands, for the munificent 
sum of £400! 



208 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

The greater portion of the beautiful valley, however, 
was almost unexplored until the Penns made the new 
purchase. About 1755, a colony of Dunkards took up 
the southern portion of the Cove, and their descendants 
hold possession of it to this day. They have unquestion- 
ably the finest farms, as well as the most fertile land, in 
the State; and right glad should we be to end tlieir por- 
tion of the chapter by saying so, or even by adding 
that for thrift and economy they stand unsurpassed; 
but a sense of candor compels us to speak of them as 
they are, — "nothing extenuate, nor set down aught in 
malice." 

In the first place, let it be understood that we are in 
no particle indebted to them for one iota of the blessings 
of government we enjoy. They are strict non-resistants; 
and in the predatory incursions of the French and In- 
dians, in 1756-63, and, in fact, during all the savage 
warfare, they not only refused to take up arms to repel 
the savage marauders and prevent the inhuman slaugh- 
ter of women and children, but they refused in the most 
positive manner to pay a dollar to support those who 
were willing to take up arms to defend their homes and 
their firesides, until wrung from them by the stern man- 
dates of the law, from which there was no appeal. 

They did the same tiling when the Revolution broke 
out. There was a scarcity of men. Sixty able-bodied 
ones among them might readily have formed a cordon of 
frontier defence, which could have prevented many of the 
Indian massacres which took place between 1777 and 
1780, and more especially among their own people in the 
Cove. But not a man would shoulder his rifle; they were 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 209 

nmi-resistants ! They miglit, at least, have furnished 
money, for they always had an abundance of that, the 
hoarding of which appeared to be the sole aim and object 
of life Avith them. But, no ; not a dollar ! They occu- 
pied neutral ground, and wished to make no resistance. 
Again; they might have furnished supplies. And they 
did furnish supplies to those who were risking their lives 
to repel the invaders, — but it was only when the almighty 
dollar accompanied the demand. 

After the massacre of thirty of them, in less than 
forty-eight hours, Colonel Piper, the lieutenant-colonel of 
Bedford county, made a stirring appeal to them. But it 
was of no avail ; they were non-resistants, and evidently 
determined to remain such. 

Of the peculiar religious tenets of these primitive 
peoj^le we do not profess to know any thing ; hence our 
remarks are unbiassed. We are solely recording his- 
torical facts. 

As a curious anomaly in the history of the j)resent 
generation, it may be stated that, although they perform 
that part of the compact between government and a good 
citizen which relates to paying taxes, tJiey never vote, 
neither can the most seductive persuasions of politicians 
bring them to the polls. Like their forefathers, they are 
non-resistants — producers, but non-consumers. 

During the Indian wars of 1762, quite a number of 
murders were committed in the Cove, and many captives 
taken, but the particulars are too vague for history. 
Although we made every effort to ascertain the names 
of some of the massacred and the circumstances attend- 
ing their massacre, we signally failed. It may, therefore, 

14 



210 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

be supposed that, in the absence of any record, there is no 
other method of ascertaining facts extant. 

During the Great Cove massacre, among others carried 
into captivity was the family of John Martin. This in- 
cursion was indeed a most formidable one, led by the 
kings Shingas and Beaver in person. How many w^ere 
killed there is no living witness to tell; neither can we 
conjecture the number of prisoners taken. The following 
petition was sent by John Martin to council : — 

August 13, 17G2. 

The Humble Petition of Your Most Obedient Servant Sheweth, 
Sir, may it pleas Your Excellancy, Hearing me in Your Clemancy 
a few Words. I, One of the Bereaved of my Wife and five Chil- 
dren, by Savage War at the Captivity of the Great Cove, after 
Many & Long Journeys, I Lately went to an Indian Town, viz., 
Tuskaroways, 150 miles Beyond Fort Pitts, & Entrested in Co'. 
Bucquits & Co^ Croghan's favor, So as to bear their Letters to 
King Beaver & Cap'. Shingas, Desiring them to Give up One of 
my Daughters to me. Whiles I have Yet two Sons & One Other 
Daughter, if Alive, Among them — and after Seeing my Daughter 
with Shingas he Refused to Give her up, and after some Expostu- 
lating with him, but all in vain, he promised to Deliver her up with 
the Other Captives to y' Excellency. 

Sir, y'' Excellency's Most Humble Serv', Humbly & Passion- 
ately Beseeches Y'' Beningn Compassion to interpose Y'' Excellencies 
Beneficent influence in favor of Y'' Excellencies Most Obedient & 
Dutiful Serv'. John Martin. 

After the march of General Forbes from Raystown, and 
immediately preceding it, no Indian depredations w^ere 
committed in the Cove up to the commencement of 
hostilities between the Colonies and Great Britain. The 
Indians in the French interest were constantly on the 
alert; and their spies prowling on the outskirts did not 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 211 

fail to report at head-quarters the arrival at Raystown of 
Colonel Boquet and his army, the formidable bearing and 
arms of which convinced the savages that it was prudent 
to keep within the bounds of the French power. 

The first Indian depredations of the Revolution in the 
Juniata Valley were committed in November, 1777. A 
large body of Indians — not less than thirty — armed with 
British rifles, ammunition, tomahawks, scalping-knives, 
and all other murderous appliances they were capable of 
using, came into the settlement with the avowed inten- 
tion of gathering scalps for His Britannic Majesty's 
officers at Detroit. Their coming was not unlooked-for, 
but the settlers were unprepared for them. The constant 
rumors afloat that a large body of savages, British, and 
tories, were coming, struck the people with so much panic 
that there was no effort made to give any such force as 
might come a warlike reception, but their energies were 
concentrated in measures of defence. 

The first Indian depredators, or at least the greater 
portion of them, were seen at a camp-fire by a party of 
hunters ; and if the proper exertions had been made to cut 
them off, few other outrages would have followed. The 
supposition is that there were two parties of about fifteen 
each, who met at or near Neffs Mill, in the Cove. On 
their way thither, the one party killed a man named 
Hammond, who resided along the Juniata, and the other 
party killed a man named Ullery, who was returning 
from Neff's Mill on horseback. They also took two 
children with them as prisoners. 

The alarm was spread among the inhabitants, and they 
fled to the nearest forts with all despatch j and on this 



212 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLEY. 

first expedition they would have had few scalps to grace 
their belts, had the Dunkards taken the advice of more 
sagacious people, and fled too ; this, hoAvever, they would 
not do. They w^ould follow but half of Cromwell's 
advice: — they were willing to put their "trust in God," 
but they would not " keep their powder dry." In short, it 
was a compound they did not use at all. 

The savages swept down through the Cove with all the 
ferocity with which a pack of wolves w^ould descend from 
the mountain upon a flock of sheej). Some few of the 
Dunkards, who evidently had a latent spark of love of life, 
hid themselves away; but by far the most of them stood 
by and witnessed the butchery of their wives and children, 
merely saying, " Gottes tcille sei getlianJ'''^' How many 
Dunkard scalps they carried to Detroit cannot now be, 
and probably never has been, clearly ascertained, — not less 
than thirty, according to the best authority. In addition to 
this, they loaded themselves with plunder, stole a number 
of horses, and under cover of night the triumphant 
warriors marched bravely away. 

Thomas Smith and George Woods, both, we believe, 
justices of the peace at the time, wrote to President 
Wharton as follows : — 

November 27, 1777. 
Gentlemen : — The present situation of this country is so truly de- 
plorable that we should be inexcusable if we delayed a moment in 



*" God's will be done." This sentence was so frequently repeated by 
the Dunkards during the massacre, that the Indians must have retained a 
vivid recollection of it. During the late war with Great Britain, some of 
the older Indians on the frontier were anxious to know of the Huntingdon 
volunteers whether the " Gotsiciltahns" still resided in the Cove. Of 
course our people could not satisfy them on such a vague point. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 213 

acquainting you with it. An Indian war is now raging around us 
in its utmost fury. Before you went down tliey killed one man at 
Stony Creek ; since that time they have killed five on the moun- 
tain, over against the heads of Dunning's Creek, killed or taken 
three at the Three Springs, wounded one, and killed some children 
by Frankstown ; and had they not providentially been discovered in 
the night, and a party gone out and fired on them, they would, in 
all probability, have destroyed a great part of that settlement in a 
few hours. A small party went out into Morrison's Cove scouting, 
and unfortunately divided ; the Indians discovered one division, and 
out of eight killed seven and wounded the other. In short, a day 
hardly passes without our hearing of some new murder ; and if the 
people continue only a week longer to fly as they have done for a 
week past, Cumberland county will be a frontier. From Mor- 
rison's, Crayl's, and Friend's Coves, Dunning's Creek, and one-half 
of the Glades, they are fled or forted ; and, for all the defence that 
can be made here, the Indians may do almost what they please. 
We keep out ranging-parties, in which we go out by turns ; but all 
that we can do in that way is but weak and ineffectual for our defence, 
because one-half of the people are fled : those that remain are too 
busily employed in putting their families and the little of their 
eff"ects that they can save and take into some place of safety, so 
that the whole burden falls upon a few of the frontier inhabitants, 
for those who are at a distance from danger have not as yet offered 
us any assistance. We are far from blaming the officers of the 
militia because they have not ordered them out, for if they had, 
they really can be of little or no service, not only for the foregoing 
reasons, but also for these : — Not one man in ten of them is armed. 
If they were armed, you are sensible, take the country through, 
there is not one fom-th man that is fit to go against Indians, and it 
might often happen that in a whole class there might not be a 
single person who is acquainted with the Indians' ways of the 
woods ; and if there should be a few good men, and the rest unfit 
for that service, those who are fit to take the Indians in their own 
way could not act with the same resolution and spirit as if they 
were sure of being properly supported by men like themselves. 
The consequence would be that the Indians, after gaining an ad- 
vantage over them, would become much more daring and fearless, 
and drive all before thera. A small number of select men would 



214 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

be of more real service to guard the frontiers than six times that 
number of people unused to arms or the woods. It is not for us to 
dictate what steps ought to be taken, but some steps ought to be 
taken without the loss of an hour. The safety of your country, 
of your families, of your property, will, we are convinced, urge you 
to do every thing in your power to put the frontiers in some state 
of defence. Suppose there were orders given to raise about one 
hundred rangers, under the command of spirited officers, who were 
well acquainted with the woods and the Indians and could take 
them in their own way. They could be raised instantly, and we 
are informed there are a great number of rifles lying in Carlisle 
useless, although the back country is suff'ering for the want of arms. 
It was a fatal step that was taken last winter in leaving so many 
guns when the militia came from camp ; about this place, especially, 
and all the country near it, they are remarkably distressed for the 
want of guns, for when the men were raised for the army you 
know we procured every gun that we could for their use. The 
country reflect hard on us now for our assiduity on those occasions, 
as ic now deprives them of the means of defence. But this is not 
the only instance in which we hear reflections which are not de- 
served. The safety of our country then loudly called on us to 
send all the arms to the camp that could be procured, and it now 
as loudly calls on us to entreat that we may be allowed some as 
soon as possible, as also some ammunition ; as that which was 
intrusted to our care is now almost delivered out to the officers who 
are fortifying, and what remains of it is not fit for rifles. We 
need not repeat our entreaties that whatever is done may be done 
as soon as possible, as a day's delay may be the destruction of 
hundreds. 

We are, in haste, gentlemen. 

Your most obedient, humble servants, 

George Woods. 

Thomas Smith. 

Bedford, November 27, 1777. 

The persons mentioned as having been killed belonged 
mostly to the Cove ; but the number was greatly exaggerated, 
as in fact but two were killed and one wounded. The 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 215 

other five escaped, and did not return until after the re- 
port of their death had gone abroad. The names of the 
killed we could not ascertain. 

The band of Indians, after the Dunkard massacre, 
worked their way toward the Kittaning war-path, leav- 
ing behind them some few stragglers of their party whose 
appetite for blood and treasure had not been satiated. 
Among others, an old and a young Indian stopped at Neff's 
Mill. Neff was a Dunkard ; but he was a single excep- 
tion so far as resistance was concerned. He had con- 
stantly in his mill his loaded rifle, and was ready for 
any emergency. He had gone to his mill in the morning 
without any knowledge of Indians being in the neighbor- 
hood, and had just set the water-wheel in motion, when 
he discovered the two Indians lurking, w^ithin a hundred 
yards, in a small wood below the mill. Without taking 
much time to deliberate how to act, he aimed through the 
window, and deliberately shot the old Indian. In an 
instant the young Indian came toward the mill, and Neff 
ran out of the back door and up the hill. The quick eye 
of the savage detected him, and he fired, but missed his 
aim. Nothing daunted by the mishap, the savage fol- 
lowed up the cleared patch, when both, as if by instinct, 
commenced reloading their rifles. They stood face to 
face, not forty yards apart, on open ground, where there 
was no possible chance of concealment. The chances 
were equal : he that loaded first would be victor in the 
strife, the other was doomed to certain death. They 
both rammed home the bullet at the same time — with 
what haste may well be conjectured. This was a critical 
juncture, for, while loading, neither took his eye off the 



216 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

other. They both drew their ramrods at the same 
instant, but the intense excitement of the moment caused 
the Indian to balk in drawing his, and the error or mis- 
hap proved fatal, because Neff took advantage of it, and 
succeeded in priming and aiming before the Indian. The 
latter, now finding the muzzle of NefF's rifle bearing upon 
him, commenced a series of very cunning gyrations and 
contortions to destroy his aim or confuse him, so that he 
might miss him or enable him to prime. To this end, he 
first threw himself upon his face; then, suddenly rising 
up again, he jumped first to the right, then to the left, 
then fell down again. Neff", not the least put ofi* his 
guard, waited until the Indian arose again, when he shot 
him through the head. 

Neff, fearing that others might be about, left the mill 
and started to the nearest settlement. A force was 
raised and the mill revisited; but it was found a heap 
of smouldering cinders and ashes, and the dead bodies of 
the Indians had been removed. It is altogether likely 
that the rear of the savage party came up shortly after 
Neff* had left, fired the mill, and carried away their 
slain companions. 

For the part Neff took in the matter he was excom^ 
municated from the Dunkard society. Nevertheless, he 
rebuilt his mill ; but the Dunkards, who w^ere his main 
support previously, refused any longer to patronize him, 
and he was eventually compelled to abandon the busi- 
ness. 

On the 4th of May, 1781, a band of marauding savages 
entered the Cove and murdered a man, woman, and two 
children, and took one man prisoner, within a mile of the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 217 

fort of John Piper, who was then colonel of the county. 
Names or particulars could not be ascertained. 

At another time — period not remembered — several pri- 
soners were taken. 

The name of the Cove was changed from the " Great 
Cove" to " Morrison's Cove," in honor of a Mr. Morris, as 
early as 1770. 



218 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

TOMMY COLEMAN, THE INDIAN FIGHTER — SURPRISE OF THE DUNKARD 
MURDERERS, ETC. 

Among all the early pioneers of the upper end of the 
Juniata Valley none was better known to the Indians 
than Thomas Coleman. His very name insj)ired them 
with terror; and, in all their marauding, they carefully 
avoided his neighborhood. He was, emphatically, an 
Indian-hater, — the great aim and object of whose life ap- 
peared to be centred in the destruction of Indians. For 
this he had a reason — a deep-seated revenge to gratify, a 
thirst that all the savage blood in the land could not 
slake, — superinduced by one of the most cruel acts of 
savage atrocity on record. 

It appears that the Coleman family lived on the West 
Branch of the Susquehanna at an early day. Their 
habitation, it would also appear, was remote from the 
settlements; and their principal occupation was hunting 
and trapping in winter, boiling sugar in spring, and 
tilUng some ground they held during the summer. 
Where they originally came from was rather a mys- 
tery; but they were evidently tolerably well educated, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 219 

and had seen more refined life than the forest afforded. 
Nevertheless, they led an apparently happy life in the 
woods. There were three brothers of them, and, what is 
not very common nowadays, they were passionately at- 
tached to each other. 

Early in the spring, — probably in the year 1763, — ^while 
employed in boiling sugar, one of the brothers discovered 
the tracks of a bear, when it was resolved that the elder 
two should follow and the younger remain to attend to 
the sugar-boiling. The brothers followed the tracks of 
the bear for several hours, but, not overtaking him, agreed 
to return to the sugar-camp. On their arrival, they found 
the remains of their brother boiled to a jelly in the large 
iron kettle! A sad and sickening sight, truly; but the 
authors of the black-hearted crime had left their sign- 
manual behind them, — an old tomahawk, red with the 
gore of their victim, sunk into one of the props which sup- 
ported the kettle. They buried the remains as best they 
could, repaired to their home, broke up their camp, 
abandoned their place a short time after, and moved 
to the Juniata Valley. 

Their first location was near the mouth of the river; but 
gradually they worked their way west, until they settled 
somewhere in the neighborhood of the mouth of Spruce 
Creek, on the Little Juniata, about the year 1770. A few 
years after, the two brothers, Thomas and Michael, the 
survivors of the family, moved to the base of the moun- 
tain, in what now constitutes Logan township, near where 
Altoona stands, which then was included within the 
Frankstown district. 

These men were fearless almost to a fault ; and on the 



220 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

commencement of hostilities, or after the first predatory 
incursion of the savages, it ap^Dcars that Thomas gave 
himself up solely to hunting Indians. He was in all 
scouting parties that were projected, and always leading 
the van when danger threatened; and it has very aptly, 
and no doubt truly, been said of Coleman, that when no 
parties were willing to venture out he shouldered his 
rifle and ranged the woods alone in hopes of occasionally 
picking up a stray savage or two. That his trusty rifle 
sent many a savage to eternity there is not a shadow of 
doubt. He, however, never said so. He was never 
known to acknowledge to any of his most intimate ac- 
quaintances that he had ever killed an Indian; and yet, 
strange as it may seem, he came to the fort on several 
occasions with rather ugly wounds upon his body, and his 
knife and tomahawk looked as if they had been used to 
some purpose. Occasionally, too, a dead savage was found 
in his tracks, but no one could tell who killed him. For 
such reserve Mr. Coleman probably had his own motives; 
but that his fights with the savages were many and 
bloody is susceptible of proof even at this late day. 
We may incidentally mention that both the Colemans 
accompanied Captain Blair's expedition to overtake the 
tories, and Thomas was one of the unfortunate " Bedford 
Scout." 

To show how well Thomas was known, and to demon- 
strate clearly that he had on sundry occasions had dealings 
with some of the savages without the knowledge of his 
friends, we may state that during the late war with Great 
Britain, on the Canadian frontier, a great many Indians 
made inquiries about " Old Coley;' and especially one, who 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 221 

represented himself as being a son of Shingas, pointed out 
to some of Captain Allison's men, who were from Hunt- 
ingdon county, a severe gash on his forehead, by which he 
said he should be likely to remember "Coley" for the 
balance of his life. 

In the fall of 1777, Fetter's Fort was occupied by some 
twenty-five men capable of bearing arms, belonging to 
the Frankstown district. Among these were both the 
Colemans, their own and a number of other settler's 
families. 

The Indians who had murdered the Dunkards, it ap- 
pears, met about a mile east of Kittaning Point, where 
they encamped, (the horses and plunder having pro- 
bably been sent on across the mountain,) in order to 
await the arrival of the scattered forces. Thomas and 
Michael Coleman and Michael Wallack had left Fetter's 
Fort in the morning for the purpose of hunting deer. 
During the day, snow fell to the depth of some three or 
four inches; and in coming down the Gap, Coleman and 
his party crossed the Indian trail, and discovered the 
moccasin tracks, which they soon ascertained to be fresh. 
It was soon determined to follow them, ascertain their 
force, and then repair to the fort and give the alarm. 
They had followed the trail scarcely half a mile before 
they saw the blaze of the fire and the dusky outlines of 
the savages seated around it. Their number, of course, 
could not be made out, but they conjectured 'that there 
must be in the neighborhood of thirty; but, in order to 
get a crack at them, Thomas Coleman made his com- 
panions promise not to reveal their actual strength to the 
men in the fort. Accordingly they returned and made 



222 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

report — once, for a wonder, not exaggerated, but rather 
underrated. The available force, amounting to sixteen men, 
consisting of the three above named, Edward Milligan, 
Samuel Jack, William Moore, George Fetter, John Fetter, 
William HoUiday, Richard Clausin, John McDonald, and 
others whose names are not recollected, loaded their rifles 
and started in pursuit of the savages. By the time they 
reached the encampment, it had grown quite cold, and the 
night was considerably advanced; still some ten or twelve 
Indians were seated around the fire. Cautiously the men 
approached, and with such silence that the very word 
of command was given in a whisper. When within sixty 
yards, a halt was called. One Indian appeared to be 
engaged in mixing paint in a pot over the fire, while the 
remainder were talking, — probably relating to each other 
the incidents attending their late foray. Their rifles were 
all leaning against a large tree, and Thomas Coleman con- 
ceived the bold design of approaching the tree, although 
it stood but ten feet from the fire, and securing their arms 
before attacking them. The achievement would have 
been a brilliant one, but the undertaking was deemed so 
hazardous that not a man would agree to second him in so 
reckless and daring an enterprise. It was then agreed 
that they all should aim, and at the given word fire. 
Coleman suggested that each man should single out a par- 
ticular savage to fire at; but his suggestion was lost upon 
men who were getting nervous by beginning to think 
their situation somewhat critical. Aim — we will not call 
it deliberate — was taken, the word ^^fireT was given, and 
the sharp report of the rifles made the dim old woods 
echo. Some three or four of the savages fell, and those 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 223 

who were sitting around the fire, as well as those who 
were lying upon the ground, instantly sprang to their feet 
and ran to the tree where their rifles stood. In the 
mean time, Coleman said — 

"Quick! quick! boys, load again! we can give them 
another fire before they know where we are !" 

But, on looking around, he was surprised to find nobody 
but Wallack and Holliday left to obey his order! The 
number proving unexpectedly large, the majority became 
frightened, and ran for the fort. 

The Indians, in doubt as to the number of their assail- 
ants, took an early opportunity to get out of the light 
caused by the fire and concealed themselves behind trees, 
to await the further operations of this sudden and unex- 
pected foe. 

Coleman, Wallack, and Holliday, deeming themselves 
too few in number to cope with the Indians, followed their 
friends to Fetter's Fort. 

Early the next diorning, all the available force of the 
fort started in pursuit of the Indians. Of course, they did 
not expect to find them at the encampment of the night 
previous; so they took provisions and ammunition along 
for several days' scout, in order, if possible, to overtake 
the savages before they reached their own country. To 
this end, Coleman was appointed to the command, and 
the march was among those denominated by military 
men as forced. 

When they reached the scene of the previous night's 
work, the evidence was plain that the savages had departed 
in the night. This the hunters detected by signs not to 
be mistaken by woodsmen ; there was not a particle of fire 



224 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

left, and the coals retained no warmth. The tracks of the 
savages west of the fire, too, showed that they conformed 
to those east of the fire, in appearance, whereas, those 
made by the hunters in the morning looked quite dif- 
ferently. It was then evident that the Indians had a start 
of some six or eight hours. 

On the spot w^here the fire had been the small earthen 
paint-pot w^as found, and in it a portion of mixed paint. 
Near the fire, numerous articles were picked up : — several 
scalping-knives, one of which the owner was evidently in 
the act of sharpening when the volley was fired, as the 
whetstone w^as lying by its side; several tomahawks, a 
powder-horn, and a number of other trifling articles. 
The ground was dyed with blood, leaving no doubt re- 
maining in regard to their execution the night j)revious. • 
They had both hilled and woimded, — but what number was 
to remain to them forever a mystery, for they carried both 

dead and wounded with them. 

$ 
This was a singular trait in savage character. The}' 

never left the body of a dead or wounded warrior behind 
them, if by any possible human agency it could be taken 
wdth them. If impossible to move it far, they usually 
buried it, and concealed the place of burial with leaves; 
if in an enemy's country, they removed the remains, even 
if in a state of partial decay, on the first opportunity that 
offered. To prevent the dead body of a brave from falling 
into the hands of an enemy appeared with them a reli- 
gious duty paramount even to sepulture. As an evidence 
of this, Sam Brady, the celebrated Indian-fighter, once 
waylaid and shot an old Indian on the Susquehanna 
who was accompanied by his two sons, aged respectively 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 225 

sixteen and eighteen years. The young Indians ran when 
their father fell, and Brady left the body and returned 
home. Next morning, having occasion to pass the j^lace, 
he found the body gone, and by the tracks he ascertained 
that it had been removed by the lads. He followed them 
forty miles before he overtook them, bearing their heavy 
burden with the will of sturdy work-horses. Brady had 
set out with the determination of killing both, but the 
sight so affected him that he left them to pursue their way 
unharmed; and he subsequently learned that they had 
carried the dead body one hundred and sixty miles. 
Brady said that w^as the only chance in his life to kill an 
Indian which he did not improve. It may be that filial 
affection prompted the young savages to carry home the 
remains of their parents; nevertheless, it is known that 
the dead bodies of Indians — ordinary fighting-men — were 
carried, without the aid of horses, from the Juniata Valley 
to the Indian burial-ground at Kittaning, and that too in 
the same time it occupied in making their rapid marches 
between the two points. 

But to return to our party. After surveying the 
ground a few moments, they followed the Indian trail — no 
difficult matter, seeing that it was filled with blood — until 
they reached the summit of the mountain, some six or 
eight miles from the mouth of the Gap. Here a consul- 
tation was held, and a majority decided that there was no 
use in follo"\ving them farther. Coleman, however, was 
eager to continue the chase, and declared his willingness 
to follow them to their stronghold, Kittaning. 

This issue, successful though it was, did not fail to spread 

alarm through the sparsely-settled country. People from 

15 



226 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the neighborhood speedily gathered their families into the 
fort, under the firm impression that they were to he 
harassed by savage warfare not only during the winter, but 
as long as the Revolutionary struggle was to continue. 
However, no more Indians appeared; this little cloud of 
war was soon dispelled, and the people betook themselves 
to their homes before the holidays of 1777, where they 
remained during the winter without molestation. 

It is said of old Tommy Coleman — but with what 
degree of truth we are unaljle to say — that, about twenty 
years ago, hearing of a delegation of Indians on their way 
to Washington, he shouldered his trusty old rifle, and 
went to Hollidaysburg. There, hearing that they had 
gone east on the canal packet, he followed them some 
three miles down the towing-path, for the express purpose 
of having a crack at one of them. This story — which 
obtained currency at the time, and is believed by many 
to this day — was probably put into circulation by some 
one who knew his inveterate hatred of Indians. An ac- 
quaintance of his informs us that he had business in 
town on the day on which the Indians passed through ; 
hence his appearance there. His gun he always carried 
with him, even on a visit to a near neighbor. That he 
inquired about the Indians is true; but it Avas merely out 
of an anxiety to see whether they looked as they did in 
days of yore. His business led him to Frankstown, but 
that business Avas not to shoot Indians ; for, if he still 
cherished any hatred toward the race, he had better sense 
than to show it on such an occasion. 

He died at his residence, of old age, about fifteen years 
ago, beloved and respected by all. Peace to his ashes! 




ARCH SPRING. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 227 



CHAPTER XX. 

SINKING VALLEY — THE LEAD MINES — FORT ROBERDEAU — INDIAN 
MURDER, AND HEROIC CONDUCT OE A WOMAN — ENCOUNTER WITH A 
SAVAGE — MURDER OF ROLLER AND BEBAULT, ETC. 

One of the most prominent points in Pennsylvania, 
during the Revolution, was Sinking Valley, owing, in a 
great measure, to the fact that it had a fort, under mili- 
tary discipline, — where the sentry marched upon ram- 
parts, where the reveille aroused the inmates at the 
dawn of da}^, and where people felt secure in the imme- 
diate presence of muskets with bristling bayonets, a pair 
of cannon, and an abundance of ammunition, and where, 
for a long time, the greater part of the lead used by the 
Continental army was procured. 

There is every reason to believe that the lead mines 
of Sinking Valley were known to the French as early as 
1750. Although they searched extensively for minerals, 
it is not probable that they ventured as far into the Penn 
lands as Sinking Valley, unless the secret of the exist- 
ence of the mines had been imparted to them by the 
Indians. 

The Indians of the Juniata, after they had acquired 
the use of fire-arms, could always procure an abundance 



228 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

of lead. This, they said, they procured — almost pure — 
on a ridge, near where Mifflintown now stands, in Kishi- 
coquillas Valley; and also at the foot, or in one of the 
ravines, of the mountain. With true Indian craft, the 
warriors kept the precise location of the lead mines a 
secret. The scarcity of lead, in early days, made it a 
valuable commodity to the settlers ; and many an Indian's 
jug was filled with whiskey on promise of showing 
the lead mines — promises that were always " kept to the 
ear, but broken to the hope." It is, therefore, pretty evi- 
dent that all the lead-ore the savages displayed was pro- 
cured in Sinking Valley; — if they obtained any at other 
places along the Juniata, the mines have not yet been 
discovered, and not for the lack of many thorough 
searches for them, either. 

The supposition that the French had been prospecting 
extensively in Sinking Valley many years ago is based 
upon the fact that, previous to Roberdeau's erecting the 
fort, several old drifts or openings were discovered, as 
well as an irregular trench, extending from the upper to 
the lower lead mines, — a distance of nearly six miles. 
The vestiges of this trench are still visible, and there is 
no question but Avhat the digging of it and the immense 
amount of labor necessary for its construction was per- 
formed in the full confidence that they would be rewarded 
by the discovery of a silver mine, or, at least, an inex- 
haustible bed of pure lead-ore. 

The fact that lead-ore existed in Sinking Valley was 
ascertained by the settlers about 1763, and the conse- 
quence was that a number of persons took up their resi- 
dence there, but without purchasing lands. The certainty 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 229 

of the existence of lead, and the fabulous stories of the 
existence of various other precious metals, induced the 
proprietary family to reserve it to themselves, and to 
that end George Woods surveyed it for them a short 
time previous to the Revolution. 

The earliest accounts we have of any permanent 
settlers in Sinking Valley bears date of 1760. There 
is a well-authenticated story of an occurrence that once 
took place in 1763, but neither names nor dates have 
been transmitted. Mr. Maguire had frequently heard the 
woman's name mentioned, who became quite a heroine, 
and lived in Sinking Valley until some time during the 
Revolution; but it had slipped his memory. 

The story was that a man occupied a cabin in the upper 
end of the valley, and one day left it to go to the mouth 
of the Bald Eagle, leaving his wife and child at home. 
No savages had been in the neighborhood for some time, 
and, in fact, no friendly Indians either, except some few 
who resided in what is now known as Tuckahoe Valley. 
Fortunately, the man jiossessed two rifles, both of which 
he loaded, placed one over the chimney-piece, the other 
upon his shoulder, and departed on his errand. While 
the woman was busy attending to her household affairs, 
she saw two Indians, partly concealed by some bushes in 
front of the house. In an instant she took down the 
loaded gun, and watched their motions through the 
window. In a few minutes both of them stealthily 
approached the house, when she pointed the gun at 
the foremost savage and fired; the bullet striking him 
in the breast, he fell to rise no more. The other savage 
came directly toward the house, when the woman, still 



230 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

retaining in her grasp tlie rifle, ascended a ladder to 
the loft, where she stood with the gun in an attitude 
of defiance. The quick eye of the Indian detected her 
movements, and he followed, but with the usual caution 
of a savage; and when his head reached the opening, he 
peered into the dark garret to see his intended victim. 
Grasping one of the puncheons which composed the floor 
with one hand, he attempted to draw up his rifle with 
the other, when a discharge followed, and he fell life- 
less to the floor. The woman, more dead than alive 
with fear, remained for a time in the loft, but, hear- 
ing no noise, she at length ventured down-stairs, and 
at the foot of the ladder found the savage perfectly 
dead, lying in a pool of blood. She took her child 
out of the cradle, and started for the mouth of the 
Bald Eagle, but fortunately met her husband but a few 
rods from the house. 

All things taken into consideration, and especially the 
fact that the woman had never pulled the trigger of a gun 
before, this w^as probably one of the most heroic acts on 
record. 

The nearest neighbors were summoned, and, on ex- 
amining into the matter, it was concluded that, after the 
first Indian had been shot, the second one immediately 
cocked his rifle, and that while ascending the ladder 
the trigger must have been touched by a twig on the 
hickory rung of the ladder. The bullet had struck him 
under the chin, passed through his tongue, and lodged 
in his brain. His death was certainly an interposition 
of Providence in behalf of the woman and her infant 
child. 









5>='iV^J\ 







THE CAVE IN SINKING VALLEY. 



HISTORY OF T1]E JUNIATA VALLEY. 231 

Sinking Yalley proper never could have been mucli of a 
resort of the Indians, for no traces of the existence of any 
villages in it have ever been discovered, neither have any 
relics ever been found or exhumed in it, that we can hear 
of, with the excejDtion of some few arrow-heads and a 
skull, found near the Arch Springs. 

The attention of Council was called to the existence of 
load in Sinking Valley in a letter from Major-General 
John Armstrong to President Wharton, dated Yorktown, 
2od February, 1778. He says: — 

As at present there appears to be a scarcity of the important 
article of lead, and it is certain a Mr. Harman Husbands, now a 
member of Assembly for our State, has some knowledge of a lead 
mine situate in a certain tract of land not far from FrankstOAvn, 
formerly surveyed for the use of the proprietary family. 

General Gates, President of the Board of War, having signified 
his earnest desire to see and converse with Mr. Husbands on the 
subject of the mine, and being greatly hurried with business, I 
have, at his instance, undertaken the present line, that you would 
please to use your influence with the House of Assembly and with 
Mr. Husbands, that he, as soon as possible, may be spared to con- 
cert with the Board of War on the best measures for making a trial 
of and deriving an early supj)ly from that source. 

The general is of opinion with me, that the mine ought to — or 
may at least for the present — be seized by and belong to the 
State; and that private persons, who, without right, may have sat 
down on that reserved tract, should neither prevent the use of the 
lead nor be admitted to make a monopoly of the mine. I am of 
opinion that a few faithful laborers may be sufiicient to make the 
experiment, and that the lieutenant of the county, or some other 
good man, may be serviceable in introducing the business. 

I cannot doubt the compliance of the honorable Assembly and 
Council. 

P.S. — It may be proper that a summary consideration be first 
taken, whether the State will make the effort alone or leave it to 



232 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the conduct of the Board of War ; that, at any rate, the salutary 
effects, if any, may be gained to the public. The water-carriage 
is a great thing. Query — Whether the ore should be run into 
portable bars at the bank, or at Middleton? 

At the writing of the above, some few persons had 
found their way to the mines, raised small quantities of 
ore, and smelted it; but their operations were contracted 
for want of tools and the proper appliances for smelting. 
They confined themselves to such ore as was on or near 
the surface, and made small oven furnaces, and smelted 
with charcoal. 

The Council soon took the suggestion of General Arm- 
strong in hand ; and it was resolved to give the general 
superintendence of the mining operations to General 
Daniel Roberdeau, then a member of Congress, who went 
forward to Carlisle to make the necessary arrangements. 
From that place he wrote to President Wharton, on the 
17th of April, 1778, as follows :— 

The confidence the honorable the representatives of our State 
have placed in me by a resolve, together with the pressing and 
indispensable necessity of a speedy supply of lead for the public 
service, induced me to ask leave of absence of Congress to pro- 
ceed with workmen to put their business into a proper train, and 
have reached this place on that errand ; and, having collected men 
and materials, and sent them forward this day, propose to follow 
them to-morrow. My views have been greatly enlarged since I 
left York on the importance of the undertaking and hazard in 
prosecuting it, for the public works here are not furnished with an 
ounce of lead but what is in fixed ammunition ; on the other hand, 
the prevailing opinion of people, as I advance into the country, 
of Indian depredations shortly to commence, might not only deter 
the workmen I stand in need of, but affright the back settlers from 
their habitations, and leave the country exposed and naked. To 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 233 

give confidence to one and the other, I have drawn out of the 
public stores here twenty-five stand of arms and a quantity of gun- 
powder, and intended to proceed this morning, but was applied to 
by John Caruthers, Esq., Lieutenant of the County, and William 
Brown, Commissary of Provisions for the Militia, who advised me 
on the subject of their respective departments, and, by the account 
they gave of the orders from your honorable board to them as to 
calling out and supplying the militia, I find the State is guarding 
against the incursions of the savages. This confirmed me in a 
preconceived intention of erecting a stockade fort in the neiglibor- 
hood of the mine I am about to work, if I could stir up the inhabit- 
ants to give their labor in furnishing an asylum for their families 
in case of imminent danger, and thus prevent the evacuation of the 
country. Mr. Caruthers, convinced of the necessity of the work 
for the above purposes, condescendingly ofi'ered one company of 
the militia, which he expected Avould consist of about forty men, 
under my command, to co-operate in so salutary a business, — as it 
consisted with the orders of Council respecting the station, being 
only a deviation of a very few miles, — and that one other com- 
pany, of about the same number, should also join me, for the 
greater expedition, until the pleasm'e of Council was known, which 
he presumed might coincide with such dispositions, otherwise it 
might be deranged by an immediate express; and, that the plea- 
sure of Council might be known without delay, I give this intel- 
ligence. If these measures are for the good of the public wheel, 
[weal,] I hope to be honored with a confirmation, and orders to 
the militia to exert themselves in carrying the design into imme- 
diate execution ; if otherwise, I rely on the well-known candor of 
Council that I shall not be suspected of any sinister design in 
leaning to an ofier freely made as above, from, I believe, the best 
motives, much less that I have presumed to interfere with the 
arrangements of Council, as this early notice is full proof to the 
contrary, as the whole is in their power as much as if nothing had 
passed between the lieutenant and myself. I have only to add, on 
this subject, that your design of patroUing-parties of good riflemen 
shall be encouraged by me. The commissary, Mr. Brown, being 
destitute of money, I would have spared it out of my small stock, 
but that, by my interference, 1200 dollars — all he asked — was 
supplied by a public officer here ; but further sums will, he said, 



234 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

be soon necessary, and he expressed much concern for the scarcity 
of provisions. I was advised very lately, by Judge McKean, of a 
quantity of salted beef in the neighborhood of Harris's Ferry ; and 
before I left York, I applied to him by letter to advise me of the quan- 
tity and quality, with a design to purchase, as I intended to employ 
a much greater number of men than are already employed at the 
lead mine, to carry on the business with vigor. If Council should 
think proper to order a quantity of said provisions up the Juniata 
for the militia, I should be glad of being favored with what I want 
through the same channel. I intend to build such a fort as, with 
sufficient provisions, under the smile of Providence, would enable 
me to defend it against any number of Indians that might pre- 
sume to invest it. If I am not prevented, by an opportunity of 
serving the State eminently by a longer stay in the wilderness, I 
purpose to return to my duty in Congress in about three weeks. 
Will Council favor me with the exemption of a number of men, 
not exceeding twenty, — if I cannot be supplied by the adjutant- 
general, who has orders co-extensive with my want of smelters and 
miners from deserters from the British army, — to suffer such to 
come to this part of the country, contrary to a preceding order? 
If Council should think such a measure of exemption for the public 
good, I should be glad to receive their orders on that head. 1 
would not intrude my sentiments on Council, but am of opinion 
that, besides the supplying of provisions to the militia in Bedford, 
it is very important that the intended stockade should be seasonably 
furnished with that article; therefore, if it should not be thought 
advisable to improve the above hint, that the provisions already 
mentioned in the neighborhood of Harris's should be left unnoticed 
until I shall have an opportunity of furnishing my own supplies 
from that stock. If I shall be advised by Mr. McKean, it is in my 
offer. My landing is at Water Street, in [on the] Juniata ; but I 
could, on notice, receive any supply from Standing Stone. 

In the mean time, the persons employed went forward 
to the mines, and, under the direction of a Scotch miner 
named Lowrie, commenced sinking shafts and raising ore 
at the upper mine. General Roberdeau arrived at Stand- 
ing Stone after the tory expedition to Kittaning, being, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 235 

as it would appear, his second visit; the first was a mere 
tour of observation. From this point he wrote as fol- 
lows to John Carothers: — 

Standing Stone, April 23, 1778. 

Sir: — The enclosed was put into my hands, to be forwarded to 
you by express. The intelligence it contains is abundantly con- 
firmed by several persons I have examined, both fugitives from the 
frontiers and some volunteers that have returned for an immediate 
supply of ammunition and provisions, to be sent forward to Sink- 
ing Spring Valley, as the troops will be obliged to quit the service 
except they are supplied without delay. Want of arms prevents 
those who would turn out. I shall furnish what I brought from 
Cai-lisle as soon as they come forward ; but it is very unfortunate 
that these arms, and the ammunition, which is coming by water, 
have been retarded by contrary wind, and probably the lowness 
of the water. To remedy this, I have despatched two canoes this 
morning to meet them on the way. I am giving Mr. Brown, who 
is here, every assistance in my power; but your aid is greatly 
wanted to stimulate the militia, and furnish arms, ammunition, 
pack-horses, and every thing necessary in your line of duty. The 
insurgents from this neighborhood, I am informed, are about 
thirty. One of them (Hess) has been taken, and confession ex- 
torted, from which it appears that this banditti expect to be joined 
by three hundred men from the other side the Alleghany; reports 
more vague mention one thousand whites and savages. The sup- 
ply of provisions for so great a number renders it improbable ; but, 
in answer to this, I have been informed by the most credible in 
this neighborhood, that strangers, supposed to be from Detroit, 
have been this winter among the disaffected inhabitants, and have 
removed with them. If you have authority to call out the militia, 
in proportion to the exigence of the times, I think it of great im- 
portance that a considerable number of men should be immediately 
embodied and sent forward to meet the enemy; for it cannot be 
expected that the volunteers will long continue in service, and I 
find that the recruiting the three companies goes on too slowly to 
expect a seasonable supply from them of any considerable number. 
If you have not authority to call the necessary aid of militia, you, 
no doubt, will apply to the honorable the Council, and may furnish 



236 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

them with my sentiments, and to the Board of War for arms and 
ammunition. With ten men here, under the command of Lieu- 
tenant Cluggaofe, in Continental service until the 1st of December 
next, I intend to move forward as soon as the arms, ammunition, 
and other things come forward, to afford an escort to Sinking 
Spring Valley, where I shall be glad to meet as great a number 
of militia as you will station there, to enable me to erect a stock- 
ade, to secure the works so necessary to the public service and 
give confidence to the frontier inhabitants, by affording an asylum 
for their women and children. These objects, I doubt not, you 
will think worthy your immediate attention and utmost exertion, 
which, I can assure you, — making the fullest allowance for the 
timidity of some and credulity of others, — is a very serious mat- 
ter ; for without immediate aid the frontiers will be evacuated, for 
all that I have been able to say has been of no avail with the 
fugitives I have met on the roads, — a most distressing sight, of 
men, women, and children, flying through fear of a cruel enemy. 
I am, respectfully, sir, your most obedient, humble servant, 

Daniel Roberdeau. 

The enclosure spoken of in Eoberdeau's letter was a 
note from Robert Smith to Robert Cluggage, of which the 
following is a copy : — 

Sir : — Be pleased to send expresses to Lieutenant Carothers by 
the first opportunity, to give him some account of insurrections on 
the South Mountain, and likewise to inspect very closely into who 
is abroad at this time and upon what occasion, as there is a suspicion, 
by information, of other insurrections rising in other parts of the 
county of Cumberland ; and in so doing you will oblige your friend 
to serve, Robert Smith. 

April 23, 1778. 

The letter of Gen. Roberdeau, as well as Smith's, were 
sent to President Wharton by Lieutenant Carothers, en- 
closed in another of his own dated at Carlisle, on the 27th 
of April. 

Previous to this, however, he sent a letter to the Council, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 237 

dated on the 24th, in which he speaks of the deplorable 
condition of the frontier and the constant alarms from 
the tories. He said: — 

The marcliing classes of the fifth battalion I have been obliged 
to send up to Sinking Valley and Bald Eagle, which will amount 
to near seventy privates. The frontiers in those parts have been 
greatly alarmed of late by a number of tories who have banded 
together, threatening vengeance to all who have taken the oath of 
allegiance to the States. This moment I have received an ex- 
press from Kishicoquillas for a supply of arms, and that Colonel 
McElevy, of Bedford county, came there express himself, with an 
account that a body of tories, near three hundred and twenty, in 
and above Standing Stone, had collected themselves together and 
driven a number of the inhabitants from Standing Stone Town. 
Immediately Colonel Buchanan and Colonel Brown marched ofi" 
with a few men who could be got equipped, and we are waiting 
with patience the issue. 

General Roberdeau wrote to Council on the 27th of 
April, after Captain Blair's return, as follows : — 

SinJdng Sjjrinff Valley, April 27, 1778. 

Sir : — I have little more time to refer you to the enclosed exami- 
nation, taken in great haste, but correct as it respects the testimony. 
The confiscation of the efi'ects of the disaffected in these parts is 
very irregular, and the brutality offered to the wives and children 
of some of them, as I have been informed, in taking from them 
even their w^earing apparel, is shocking. I wish the magistrates 
were furnished with the late law respecting confiscation, and that 
they were more capable ministers of justice ; the one I have seen 
is such a specimen of the popular election of these officers as I ex- 
pected. I am happy to inform you that a very late discovery of a 
new vein promises the most ample supply ; but I am very deficient 
in workmen. Mr. Glen is with me, to direct the making and burn- 
ing of bricks, and is to come up to build a furnace, by which time 
I expect to be in such forwardness as to afford an ample supply to 



238 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the army. The ^Yant of provision I dread notwithstanding the 
active endeavors of Mr. Brown, for it is scarcely to be got ; there- 
fore I beg leave to refer you to a hint on this subject in my letter 
from Carlisle. Of forty militia, I have, at most, seven with mc, 
which retards building a stockade to give confidence to the inhabit- 
ants, who were all on the wing before I reached this. I send 
Richard Weston, under guard, to Carlisle jail, to wait your orders. 
He is conducted by Lieutenant John Means, of the militia. The 
inhabitants are hunting the other insurgents, and hope they will all 
be taken, but wish any other the trovible of examining them, as my 
hands are full. I am, with respectful salutations to Council, sir, 

Y' most ob', humb' serv*, 

Dan'- Roberdeau. '■ 

The general speaks of the tory Hess (in his first 
letter) as if he had been, forced to confess. This is 
an error. Hess made a voluntary confession after the 
return of Cap)tain Blair, and after some of Blair's men 
had partially hung him and let him off. 

The statement that McElevy reported at Kishicoquillas 
that three hundred and twenty tories had driven off 
some of the inhabitants of Standing Stone Town is no 
doubt true enough, but no such occurrence ever took 
place. The fears of the people no doubt prompted Mc- 
Elevy to exaggerate, in order to get aid forthwith. 
Shortly after the arrival of Buchanan and Brown at 
Standing Stone, the Blair expedition returned, so that 
their services were not required. 

General Roberdeau complained of the manner in which 
confiscations were conducted. He was grossly misin- 
formed. The facts in the case are simply these : — On the 
receipt of the news of the disasters met by the tories at 
Kittaning, many of the tory families fled, leaving every 
thing behind them. These articles, even if wearing ap- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 239 

parel was included, coidd not well escape confiscation 
unless they were pitched into the street. There is no 
instance on record of the women and children of tories 
having any thing like wearing-apparel taken from them. 
If such acts were committed, they were without the 
sanction of the officers or the people, by outlaws who lived 
by plunder, who may be found in any community, and 
for whose acts most assuredly the patriots should not 
have been held accountable. 

General Roberdeau's stay at the mines must have been 
brief The next we hear of him is in a letter to Vice- 
President Bryan, dated at York, on the 30th of May of the 
same year. The direction of affairs at the mines was 
probably left in the hands of Lowrie and Cluggage. 

It is altogether uncertain how long the mines were 
carried on by government, but not longer, probably, than 
till the fall of 1779; and what the total yield of lead was 
during that time we cannot ascertain. In one place in 
the Records we find an order forwarded to one of the 
sub-lieutenants of the county for five hundred pounds; 
and we also hear that quantities were issued to the 
militia at sundry times. There must have been some 
kind of a bargain existing between government and Rober- 
deau for taking out the lead, for, in a letter to Vice-Presi- 
dent Bryan for some pay due him, he says, " My late en- 
gagement in the lead- works has proved a moth to my cir- 
culating cash, and obliged me to make free with a friend 
in borrowing." He also says, in a letter to President 
Reed, bearing date November 10, 1779 : — 

Sir : — Permit me to ask the favor of you to make my request 
known to the honorable Board of your Presidence that they would 



240 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

be pleased this day to order me payment for the ten hundred 
pounds of lead delivered to your order some months ago. The price 
of that article is so enormous that I should blush to make a de- 
mand, but my necessity keeps equal pace "with the rapid depre- 
ciation of our money; and particularly as I purpose leaving the 
city to-morrow, dependence has been had on the money in ques- 
tion, for my advances are insupportably great, for my defected 
purpose of supplying lead to Continent, which, entirely through 
default of Congress in not furnishing the necessary defences, has 
been entirely stopped, as the honorable the Assembly have been in- 
formed. After the most diligent inquiry, I cannot find less than 
six dollars per pound demanded for lead by the quantity, — a price 
which, Mr. Peters just now informed me, the Board of War was 
willing to give. 

This epistle near about fixes the time of the abandon- 
ment of the mines; and it also shows that lead com- 
manded rather an exhorbitant price at that time — paj- 
able, of course, in Continental funds. 

In 1779, Sinking Spring Valley contained, according to 
an anonymous writer, "sixty or seventy families, living 
in log-houses." The principal portion of these were 
foreigners, who were taken there to work the mines. 
After Roberdeau's project had fallen to the ground, in con- 
sequence of the scarcity of the ore and the immense ex- 
pense of mining and melting it, these miners attempted 
for a while to carry on operations for themselves. Their 
close proximity to the Indians, and the fact that several in- 
cursions were made into the valley by the savages in search 
of plunder and scalps, made those men, unused to border 
life, quit, and seek refuge in the Atlantic cities. The fort 
was evacuated by the government militia. Nevertheless 
it was still a place of refuge, and was used by the settlers of 
Sinking Valley and Bald Eagle up to the close of the war. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 241 

In 1781, Jacob Roller, Jr., and a man named Bebaiilt, 
were massacred by Indians in Sinking Valley. Few 
particulars of this massacre are known, and many con- 
tradictory stories still exist in regard to it. We give 
Mr. Maguire's version of it, but would at the same time 
state that he did not vouch for the authenticity of it, as 
he gathered it from the exaggerated rumors that in those 
days followed the recital of current events. 

Eoller, it appears was an active and energetic frontier- 
man, bold, fearless, and daring; and the common belief was 
that his unerring rifle had ended the days of many a red- 
skin. Be that as it may, however, it is certain that the 
Indians knew him, and marked him out for a victim long 
before they succeeded in desjjatching him. Several small 
roving bands were in the habit of coming down into the 
valley after the mines were abandoned; but no favorable 
opportunity offered for a long time to kill Roller. 

On one occasion, four of the settlers had met at Roller's 
house for the purpose of going on a hunt for deer. Early 
in the morning, when just ready to start. Roller heard the 
breaking of a twig near his cabin. He peered out into the 
deep gloom of the misty morning, and discovered three 
Indians crouching near an oak-tree. It was very evi- 
dent that the Indians had not been close enough to the 
house to ascertain the number within, and the inmates 
were in a state of doubt as to the number of savages. Pro- 
found silence was observed, and it was resolved to shoot 
from the window as soon as the light was sufficiently 
strong to render their aim certain. The Indians were 
evidently waiting for Roller to come out of his house. At 
length, when they thought the proper time had come, the 

16 



242 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

settlers gathered at the window, and thrust out their rifles 
as silently as possible. The quick eyes of the savages saw, 
even by the hazy light, that there were too many muzzles 
to belong to one man, and they took to the woods with all 
the sjieed they could command, leaving behind them a 
quantity of venison and dried corn, and a British rifle. 

On another occasion. Roller had an encounter with a 
single Indian in the woods, which probably stands un- 
paralleled in the history of personal encounters between a 
savage and a white man. Roller left home about seven 
o'clock in the morning, in search of deer. He had ranged 
along the edge of the mountain an hour or two, when he 
heard a rifle-shot but a short distance from him, and a 
minute had scarcely elapsed before a wounded doe came 
in the direction where he stood. To shoot it was but the 
work of an instant, because he supposed that one of his 
neighbors had wounded it ; for the thought of the presence 
of Indians never entered his head. Yet it appears that it 
was an Indian who fired. The Indian mistook the crack 
of Roller's rifle for that of a companion left at the base of 
the mountain. Under this impression, the Indian, anxious 
to secure the doe, and Roller, intent on bleeding her, both 
neglected one of the first precautions of the day, — viz. : to 
reload their rifles. Roller was leaning over the doe, when 
he heard the crust of the snow breaking in a thicket near 
him. He jumped to his feet, and was confronted by the 
Indian, — a tall, muscular fellow, who was quite as large as 
Roller. The savage, well aware of the fact that neither 
of the rifles were loaded, and probably satisfied in meeting 
" a foeman worthy of his steel," deliberately placed his 
gun against a tree by the side of Roller's, and, drawing his 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 243 

tomahawk, he cast a glance of savage delight at the white 
man before him, which seemed to imply that he would 
soon show him who was the better man of the two. Rol- 
ler, anticipating his intentions, drew his tomahawk and 
stood on the defensive. The savage made a spring, when 
Roller jumped aside, and the Indian passed. The latter 
suddenly wheeled, when Roller struck him upon the elbow 
of the uplifted hand, and the hatchet fell. Fearing to 
stoop to regain it, the savage drew his knife, and turned 
upon Roller. They clinched, and a fearful struggle en- 
sued. Roller held the savage's right arm, so as to render 
useless his knife, while the Indian grasped firmly the 
hand in which Roller held his hatchet, and in this man- 
ner they struggled until they were both tripped by the 
carcass of the doe; still both retained their hold. Roller 
fortunately grasped his knife, lying beside the doe, with 
his left hand, and thrust it into the side of the Indian. 
The struggle now became terrible, and by one powerful 
effort the savage loosened himself and sprang to his feet; 
but Roller was as quick as he was. In attempting to 
close again, the savage stabbed Roller in the shoulder 
and in the arm. Roller had dropped his hatchet in re- 
gaining his feet, and the combat was now a deadly one 
with knives. They cut and thrust at each other until 
their buckskin hunting-shirts were literally cut into rib- 
bons and the crusted snow was dyed with their blood. 
At length, faint with the loss of blood, the combat ceased, 
by mutual consent, as it were, and the Indian, loosening 
himself from Roller's grasp, took his rifle and disappeared. 
Roller stanched, with frozen snow and some tow, the only 
dangerous wound he had, and managed to reach his home. 



244 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

He was stabbed in four or five places, and it was some 
weeks before he fully recovered from his wounds. The 
skeleton of the savage, with his rifle b}^ his side, was found 
the succeeding summer on the top of Warrior Ridge. 

The time of Roller's death is not positively known. 
Mr. Maguire thought it was in the fall of 1781. From 
subsequent evidences, three Indians came down the moun- 
tain, avoiding the fort of Jacob Roller, Sr., which was 
located at the head of Sinking Valley, and passed on down 
through the valley to the house of Bebault, whom they 
tomahawked and scalped. 

From thence they went to the house of Jacob Roller, 
Jr., who was alone at the time, his family being at his 
father's fort. He was murdered and scalped while at 
work in his corn-field. His absence from the fort at 
night created alarm, and early next morning a party 
went down to his house to see if any thing had befallen 
him. While searching for him, one of the men discovered 
blood on the bars, which soon led to the discovery of his 
body in the field. From the footprints in the ground, it 
was plain that the murder had been committed by two 
men and a boy between twelve and fourteen years of age. 
Roller had been shot and scalped, his head shockinglj^ 
mangled with a tomahawk, and the region of his heart 
was gashed with a dozen cuts and stabs made by a sharp 
scalping-knife. The inference was that, after shooting 
Roller, the men induced the lad to tomahawk and stab 
him. In other words, they gave him a lesson in butchery 
and courage. 

Bebault was found shot and scalped, although still 
alive, — a shocking spectacle to look upon. He was so 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 245 

much exhausted by the loss of blood as to be unable to 
give any account of the transaction. 

The bodies of both were taken to the fort and buried, 
and, as soon as possible, a large party, consisting of the 
Rollers, Beattys, Rickets, &c., started in pursuit. They 
followed the trail for nearly fifty miles, but at last lost it, 
and were compelled to return without overtaking the 
murderers. 

Every settler knew Roller, and his death cast a univer- 
sal gloom over the valley. The manner of it alarmed the 
settlement to such an extent that such fall crops as were 
still out were suffered to rot upon the field, as no force 
could be spared from the forts, and people would no longer 
risk their lives to the mercy of the marauders. 

Jacob Roller, Jr., was the oldest of seven brothers, all 
powerful fellows, and active frontier-men. 

There are quite a number of the descendants of the 
seven brothers, who reside in various places, — some in the 
West, but probably a majority of them at Williamsburg, 
or in the neighborhood of Springfield Furnace, in Blair 
county. 

Richard B. McCabe, Esq., in a series of reminiscences 
of old times, published in 1832, while speaking of the 
lead mines in Sinking Valley, said : — 

The Upper Lead Mine, as it is called, on the lands now belonging 
to a German family of the name of Crissman, exhibits but the traces 
of former excavation, and trifling indications of ore. The lower 
one, about a mile in direct distance from the Little Juniata, was 
worked within my remembrance, under the superintendence of a 
Mr. Sinclair, a Scotch miner from the neighborhood of Carron Iron- 
works, in the "land o' cakes." The mine was then owned by two 
gentlemen named Musser and Wells. The former, I think, lived 



246 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

and died in Lancaster county. Mr. Wells was probably a Phila- 
delphian. Three shafts were sunk to a great depth on the side of 
a limestone-hill. A drift was worked into the bowels of the hill, 
possibly a hundred yards, six feet high, and about the same width. 
This was expensive. No furnace or other device for melting the 
ore was ever erected at this mine. Considerable quantities of the 

mineral still lie about the pit's mouth. The late Mr. H , of 

Montgomery county, who had read much and practised some in 
mining, (so far as to sink some thousand dollars,) visited this mine 
in 1821, in company Avith another gentleman and myself, and 
expressed an opinion that the indications were favorable for a good 
vein of the mineral. But the vast mines of lead in the West, such 
as Mine a Barton and the Galena, where the manufacture of lead 
can be so much more cheaply carried on, must forever prevent a 
resumption of the business in Sinking Valley, unless, indeed, some 
disinterested patriot shaW procure the adoption of a, tariff of pro- 
tection for the lead-manufacturer of the happy valley. 

Notwithstandiiig Mr. McCabe's prediction implied that 
the lead mines of Sinking Valley would in all probability 
never be worked again, some enterprising individuals 
from New York prospected at the upper mine so late as 
1852, and soon found, as they supposed, sufficient en- 
couragement to sink shafts. Accordingly, several were 
sunk, the German heirs agreeing to take a certain per- 
centage on all ore raised. A regular company was organ- 
ized, and, for a while, the " Sinking Valley Lead Mining 
Company" stock figured among the bulls and. bears of 
Wall Street, in New York. Extensive furnaces for smelt- 
ing, and other operations on a large scale, were talked of j 
but suddenly, one very fine day, the ore, like the Yankee's 
horse, "gin eoiit/' the superintendent left, the miners fol- 
lowed, and the stock depreciated so rapidly that it could 
have been purchased for about one cent on the dollar. 
Latterly, we have heard nothing whatever of the Lead 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 247 

Mining Company. There is unquestionably lead-ore still 
left at the upper mine ; but, in order to make the mining 
operations pay, foreign wars must create a demand at 
increased prices. 

The people of Sinking Valley long entertained the idea 
that stores of mineral wealth still existed in it; and a 
legend was current that a man from the city of Phila- 
delphia, on the strength of a letter from Amsterdam, 
came there to seek for a portion of it in the shape of a 
canoe-load of bullion, buried by two men many years ago. 
The person who searched found some of the guide-marks 
pointed out to him, but he did not reach the bullion. 
The treasure, it is generally believed to this day by the 
older residents, was found by a Mr. Isett, while engaged 
in digging a mill-race. This belief was based upon the 
fact that, previous to digging the race, Mr. Isett was poor, 
but became wealthy and abandoned the digging of the 
race before it was half completed. 

We have incidentally mentioned the name of a SSotch 
miner taken to Sinking Valley by General Roberdeau, 
named Lowrie. He was the head of an illustrious line of 
descendants, some of whom have figured in Congress, at 
the bar, on the bench, and in the pulpit. One of the 
present Supreme Judges of Pennsylvania is a grandson of 
the old Scotch miner, and nearly all of the name in the 
Union are his lineal descendants. 

Truly may it be said that Sinking Valley was once a 
place of note. 



248 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XXL 

TORIES OP THE VALLEY — THEIR UNFORTUNATE EXPEDITION TO JOIN 
THE INDIANS AT KITTANING — CAPTAIN JOHN WESTON, THE TORY 
LEADER — CAPTAIN THOMAS BLAIR — CAPTURE OF THE BROTHERS 
HICKS — HANGING A TORY — NARROW ESCAPE OF TWO OF WESTON's 
MEN, ETC. 

A SUCCESSFUL rebellion is a revolution ; an unsuccessful 
attempt at revolution is a rebellion. Hence, had the 
Canadians been successful in their attempt to throw off 
the British yoke in 1837, the names of the leaders would 
have embellished the pages of history as heroes and 
patriots, instead of going down to posterity as convicts 
transported to the penal colonies of England. Had the 
efforts of the Cubanos to revolutionize the island of Cuba 
been crowned with success, the cowardly ^^ filllhusteros' 
would have rated as brave men, and, instead of perishing 
ignominiously by the infamous garote and starving in the 
dismal dungeons of Spain, they would now administer the 
affairs of state, and receive all tlie homage the world pays 
to great and successful warriors. On the other hand, had 
the revolution in Texas proved a failure, Burleson, Lamar, 
Houston, and others, who carved their names upon the 
scroll of fame as generals, heroes, and statesmen, would 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 249 

either have suffered the extreme penalty of the Mexican 
law, or at least occupy the stations of obscure adventurers, 
with all the odium which, like the poisoned shirt of 
Nessus, cUngs to those who are unsuccessful in great 
enterprises. 

The same may be said of the American Revolution. 
If those who pledged their "lives, their fortunes, and 
their sacred honor," to make the colonies independent of 
all potentates and powers on earth, had lost the stake, 
the infamy which now clings to the memory of the 
tories would be attached to that of the rebels, notwith- 
standing the latter fought in a glorious cause, endured the 
heats of summer and braved the joeltings of the winter's 
storms, exhausted their means, and shed their blood, for 
the sacred cause in which they were engaged. For this 
reason, we should not attach too much infamy to the 
tories merely because they took sides with England ; but 
their subsequent acts, or at least a portion of them, were 
such as to leave a foul blot upon their names, even had 
victory perched upon the cross of St. George. The Ame- 
rican people, after the Revolution, while rej)osing on the 
laurels they had won, might readily have overlooked and 
forgiven weak and timid men who favored the cause of 
the crown under the firm conviction that the feeble colo- 
nies could never sever themselves from the iron grasp of 
England; but when they remembered the savage bar- 
barities of the tories, they confiscated the lands of all 
who were attainted with treason, drove them from the 
country, and attached black and undying infamy to their 
names. 

To some it may appear strange — nevertheless it is true — 



250 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

that, in 1777, the upper end of the Juniata Valley con- 
tained nearly as many tories as it did patriots. This is 
not a very agreeable admission to make by one who has 
his home in the valley; nevertheless, some of the acts of 
these tories form a part of the history of the time of 
which we write, and must be given with the rest. Let it 
be understood, however, that, as some of the descendants 
of those men, who unfortunately embraced the w^rong 
side, are still alive and in our midst, we suppress names, 
because we not only believe it to be unprincipled in the 
extreme to hold the son responsible for the sins and 
errors of the fathers, but we think there is not a man 
in the valley now who has not patriotic blood enough in 
his veins to march in his country's defence at a moment's 
warning, if occasion required it. 

The great number of tories in what now constitutes 
Huntingdon county may, in a great measure, be attri- 
buted to the fact, that, living as they did upon the 
frontier, they had no idea of the strength or numbers 
composing the " rebel" army, as they called it. They 
knew the king's name to be " a tower of strength ;" 
and they knew, too, the power and resources of Eng- 
land. Their leaders were shrewd men, who excited 
the fears of the king's followers by assuring them that 
the rebels would soon be worsted, and all of them gib- 
beted. 

The most of these tories, according to Edward Bell, 
resided in Aughwick, Hare's Valley, on the Raystown 
Branch, in Woodcock Valley, at Standing Stone, Shaver's 
Creek, Warrior's Mark, and Canoe Creek. They held 
secret meetings, generally at the house of John Weston, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 251 

who resided a mile and a half west of Water Street, in 
Canoe Valley. All their business was transacted with the 
utmost secres J ; and those who participated in their meet- 
ings did so under an oath of " allegiance to the king and 
death to the rebels." 

These meetings were frequently attended by tory 
emissaries from Detroit, who went there advised of all 
the movements of the British about the lakes; and it is 
thought that one of these men at length gave them a 
piece of intelligence that sealed the doom of a majority 
of them. 

It appears that a general plan Avas formed to concen- 
trate a large force of Indians and tories at Kittaning, 
then cross the mountain by the Indian Path, and at 
Burgeon's Gap divide, — one party march through the 
Cove and Conococheague Valleys, the other to follow the 
Juniata Valley, and form a junction at Lancaster, killing 
all the inhabitants on their march. The tories were to 
have for their share in this general massacre all the fine 
farms on the routes, and the movable property was to be 
divided among the Indians. It would seem, however, 
that Providence frustrated their plans. They elected 
John Weston their captain, and marched away in the 
dead of night, without drums or colors, to join the 
savages in a general massacre of their neighbors, early in 
the spring of 1778 — all being well armed with rifles fur- 
nished by the British emissaries, and abundance of am- 
munition. They took up the line of march — avoiding 
all settlements — around Brush Mountain, and travelled 
through the Path to Kittaning. When near the fort, 
Weston sent forward two men to announce their coming. 



252 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

The savages, to the number of ten or twelve, accom- 
panied the messengers; and when they met the tories, 
Weston ordered his men to " present arms." The order 
proved a fatal one; for the Indians, ever suspecting 
treachery, thought they had been entrapped, and, with- 
out any orders, fired a volley among the tories, and 
killed Weston and some eight, or probably ten, of his 
men, then turned and ran toward the town. The dis- 
heartened tories fled in every direction as soon as their 
leader fell. 

Although these tories marched from the settlements 
under cover of night, and with the greatest possible cau- 
tion, all their movements were watched by an Indian 
spy in the employ of Major Cluggage. This spy was a 
Cayuga chief, known as Captain Logan, who resided in 
the valley at the time, — subsequently at an Indian tow^n 
called Chickalacamoose, where the village of Clearfield 
now stands. He knew the mission of the tories, and he 
soon reported their departure through the settlements. 
Of course, the wildest and most exaggerated stories were 
soon set afloat in regard to the number constituting Wes- 
ton's company, as well as those at Kittaning ready to 
march. Colonel Piper, of Yellow Creek, George Woods, 
of Bedford, and others, wrote to Philadelphia, that two 
hundred and fifty tories had left Standing Stone, to join 
the Indians, for the purpose of making a descent upon 
the frontier, — a formidable number to magnify out of 
thirty-four; yet such was the common rumor. 

The greatest terror and alarm spread through the settle- 
ments, and all the families, wdth their most valuable 
effects, were taken to the best forts. General Koberdeau, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 253 

who had the command of the forces in the neighborhood, 
had left Standing Stone a short time previous, leaving 
Major Cluggage in command. The latter was appealed 
to for a force to march after Weston. This he could not 
do, because his command was small, and he was engaged 
in superintending the construction of the fort at Sinking 
Valley, the speedy completion of which was not only 
demanded to afford protection to the people, but to guard 
the miners, who were using their best exertions to fill the 
pressing orders of the Revolutionary army for lead. 

Cluggage was extremely anxious to have Weston and 
his command overtaken and punished, and for this pur- 
pose he tendered to Captain Thomas Blair, of Path Valley, 
the command of all who wished to volunteer to fight 
the tories. The alarm was so general, that, in forty- 
eight hours after Weston's departure, some thirty-five 
men were ready to march. Twenty of them were from 
Path Valley, and the remainder were gathered up be- 
tween Huntingdon — or Standing Stone, as it was then 
still called — and Frankstown.'^ At Canoe Vallc}^ the 
company was joined by Gersham and Moses Hicks, who 
went to act in the double capacity of scouts and inter- 
preters. They were brothers, and had — together with 
the entire family — been in captivity among the Indians 



* It is to be regretted that Mr. Maguire was so feeble, when giving us 
an account of this expedition, that we feared to ask him for a repetition 
of the names of Captain Blair's command. He knew the names of all 
of them, but he mentioned them in such rapid succession that we only 
remember Brotherton, Jones, Moore, Smith, two brothers named Hicks, 
Nelson, Coleman, Wallack, Fee, Gano, Ricketts, Caldwell, Moore, Holli- 
day, and one of the Rollers. 



254 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

for some six or seven years. They were deemed a valua- 
ble acquisition. 

Captain Blair pushed on his men with great vigor over 
the mountain, by way of the Kittaning trail; and when 
he arrived where the path crosses the head-waters of 
Blacklick, they were suddenly confronted by two of 
Captain Weston's tories, well known to some of Blair's 
men, Avho, on the impulse of the moment, would have 
shot them down, had it not been for the interference 
of Ca^Dtain Blair, who evidently was a very humane 
man. These men begged for their lives most piteously, 
and declared that they had been grossly deceived by Wes- 
ton, and then gave Captain Blair a true statement of what 
had occurred. 

Finding that Providence had anticipated the object of 
their mission, by destroying and disj^ersing the tories, 
Captain Blair ordered his men to retrace their stej)s for 
home. Night coming upon them, they halted and en- 
camped near where Loretto now stands. Here it was 
found that the provisions had nearly run out. The men, 
on the strength of the reported destruction of Weston, 
were in high spirits, built a large fire, and passed the 
night in hilarity, although it was raining and exceed- 
ingly disagreeable. At the dawn of day, Gersham and 
Moses Hicks started out in search of game for breakfast, 
for some of the men were weak and disheartened for the 
want of food. These wood-rangers travelled three miles 
from the camp without anticipating any danger what- 
ever, when Gersham shot a fine elk, which, in order to 
make the load as light as possible, the brothers skinned 
and disemboweled, shouldered the hind-quarters, and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 255 

were ready to return to the camp, when five Indians sud- 
denly came upon them and took them prisoners. They 
were again captives, and taken to Detroit, from which 
place they did not return until after peace was declared. 
These men unquestionably saw and experienced enough 
of Indian life to fill an interesting volume. 

In the mean time, the company becoming impatient at 
the continued absence of the Hicks, several small parties 
were formed to go in search of them. One of these par- 
ties fell in with three Indians, and several shots were ex- 
changed without injuring any person. The Indians took 
to the woods, and the men returned to the camp. The 
other party found the place where the elk had been 
skinned, and took the remains to the camp; the meat 
was speedily roasted and divided among the men, and the 
line of march again taken up. The certain capture of 
the guides, and the Indians seen by the party in search 
of them, induced the belief that a larger body of them 
than they wished to encounter in their half-famished con- 
dition was in the neighborhood, considerably accelerated 
their march. 

The sufferings endured by these men, who were 
drenched by torrents of rain and suffered the pangs of 
hunger until they reached the settlements on the east 
side of the mountain, were such as can be more readily 
imagined than described. But they all returned, and, 
though a portion of them took sick, they all eventually 
recovered, and probably would have been ready at any 
time to volunteer for another expedition, even with the 
terrors of starvation or the scalping-knife staring them 
in the face. 



256 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

The torles who, through the clemency of Captain Blair, 
escaped shooting or hanging, did not, it seems, fare much 
better; for they, too, reached the settlements in an almost 
famished condition. Fearing to enter any of the houses 
occu|)ied, they passed the Brush Mountain into Canoe 
Valley, where they came to an untenanted cabin, the 
former occujoants having fled to the nearest fort. They 
incautiously set their rifles against the cabin, entered it, 
and searched for food, finding nothing, however, but part 
of a jDot of boiled mush and some lard. In their con- 
dition, any thing bearing resemblance to food was a god- 
send, and they fell vigorously to work at it. While 
engaged in appeasing their apjDctite, Samuel Moore and a 
companion, — probably Jacob Roller, Sr., if we mistake 
not, — who were on a hunting expedition, happening to 
pass the cabin, saw the rifles, and immediately secured 
them, when Mr. Moore w^alked in with his gun cocked, 
and called upon the tories to surrender; which peremp- 
tory order they cheerfully complied with, and were 
marched to Holliday's Fort. On the way thither, one of 
them became insolent, and informed Moore and his com- 
panion that in a short time they would repent arrest^ 
ing them. This incensed Roller, and, being an athletic 
man, when they arrived at the fort he fixed a rope to the 
tory's neck, rove it over a beam, and drew him up. 
Moore, fortunately, was a more humane man, and per- 
suaded his companion to desist. They were afterward 
taken to Bedford; but w^hether ever tried or not, we 
have not been able to ascertain. 

Captain Blair's men, while passing through what is 
now known as Pleasant Valley, or the ujDjper end of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 257 

Tuckahoe, on their return, paid a visit to a toiy named 
John Hess, who, it is said, was armed, and waiting the 
return of Weston to join his company. They found Hess 
in his house, from which they took him to a neighboring 
wood, bent down a hickory sapling and fastened the 
branches of it around his neck, and, at a given signal, let 
him swing. The sight was so shocking, and his struggles 
so violent, that the men soon repented, and cut him down 
before he was injured to any extent. It appears from 
that day he was a tory no longer, joined the rangers, and 
did good service for his country. His narrow escape must 
have wrought his conversion. 

The tories who escaped the fatal error of the Indians 
at Kittaning never returned to their former homes. It 
was probably as well that they did not, for their coming 
was anxiously looked for, and their greeting would un- 
questionably have been as icarm a one as powder and 
ball could have been capable of giving. Most of them 
made their way to Fort Pitt, and from thence toward the 
South. They eventually all sent for their families; but 
" the land [of the Juniata Valley] that knew them once 
knew them no more forever !" 

Captain Blair, whom we have frequently mentioned, 
soon after or about the close of the war moved to what 
is known as the mouth of Blair's Gap, w^est of Hollidays- 
burg, where John Walker now lives. He was an ener- 
getic man, and, by his untiring exertions, succeeded in 
getting a pack-horse road cut through his gap at an early 
day. 

His son, Captain John Blair, a prominent and useful 

17 



258 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLET. 

citizen, flourished for many years at the same place. 
His usefuhiess and standing in the community made him 
probably the most conspicuous man of his day in this 
section; and, when Huntingdon county was divided, his 
old friends paid a tribute to his memory in giving the new 
county his name. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLEY. 259 



CHAPTER XXII. 

THE TORY HARE — MURDER OF LOUDENSLAGER — ABDUCTION AND 
MURDER OF MRS. EATON AND CHILDREN — TREATMENT OF HARE BY 
THE SETTLERS, ETC. 

During the troubles which followed immediately after 
the declaration of war, a great many depredations were 
committed by the tories, that were invariably charged to 
the Indians. As we have stated in the preceding chap- 
ter, the patriots and the tories, in point of numbers, were 
about equally divided in many of the settlements of what 
now constitutes Huntingdon county ; yet the victims of 
tory wrongs could not for a long time bring themselves 
to believe that they were inflicted by their neighbors. 
Barns and their valuable contents were laid in ashes, 
cattle were shot or poisoned, and all charged to the 
Indians, although scouts were constantly out, but seldom, 
if ever, got upon their trail. 

In a small isolated valley, about a mile south of Jack's 
Narrows, lived a notorious tory named Jacob Hare. We 
could not ascertain what countryman Hare was, nor any 
thing of his previous history. He owned a large tract of 
land, which he was exceedingly fearful of losing. Hence 
he remained loyal to the king, under the most solemn con- 



260 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

viction, no doubt, that the struggle would terminate in 
favor of the crown. He is represented as having been a 
man of little intelligence, brutal and savage, and cowardly 
in the extreme. Although he did not take up arms 
positively against the Colonists, he certainly contributed 
largely to aid the British in crushing them. 

A short time previous to the Weston Tory Expedition, 
a young man named Loudenslager, who resided in the 
upper end of Kishicoquillas, left his home on horseback, 
to go to Huntingdon, w^here Major Cluggage was enlisting 
men to guard the lead mines of Sinking Valley. It was 
young Loudenslager's intention to see how things looked, 
and, if they suited, he would join Cluggage's command and 
send his horse home. As he was riding leisurely along 
near the head of the valley, some five or six Indians, ac- 
companied by a white man, appeared upon an eminence, 
and three of them, including the white man, fired at him. 
Three buckshot and a slug lodged in his thigh, and one 
bullet Avhistled past his ear, while one of the buckshot 
struck the horse. The animal took fright, and started off 
at a full gallop. Loudenslager, although his thigh-bone 
was shattered and his wound bled so profusely that he 
left a trail of blood in his wake, heroically clung to 
his horse until he carried him to the Standing Stone 
fort. 

Weak and faint from the loss of blood, when he got there 
he was unable to move, and some of the people carried 
him in and cared for him as well as they could; but he 
was too much exhausted to give any account of the occur- 
rence. After some restoratives were applied, he rallied, 
and gave a statement of the affair. His description of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 261 

the white man in company with the Indians was so 
accurate, that the people knew at once that Hare, if not 
the direct author, was the instigator, of this diabolical 
outrage. 

Loudenslager, for want of good medical attendance or 
an experienced surgeon, grew worse, and the commander, 
to alleviate his sufferings if possible, placed him in a 
canoe, and despatched him, accompanied bj some men, 
on his way to Middletown, — then the nearest point of any 
importance; but he died after the canoe had descended 
the river but a few miles. 

The excitement occasioned by the shooting of young 
Loudenslager was just at its height when more bad news 
was brought to Standing Stone Fort. 

On the same day, the same party that shot Louden- 
slager went to the house of Mr. Eaton, (though jDrobably 
unaccompanied by Hare,) in the upper end of the same 
valley; but, not finding any men about the house, — Mr. 
Eaton being absent, — they took captives Mrs. Eaton and 
her two children, and then set fire to all the buildings. 
The work of devastation was on the point of being com- 
pleted when Mr. Eaton reached his home. He did not 
wait to see his house entirely reduced to ashes, but 
rode to Standing Stone as fast as his horse could carry 
him, and spread the alarm. The exasperated people 
could hardly muster sufficient patience to hear the par- 
ticulars before they started in pursuit of the enemy. 
They travelled with all the speed that energetic and 
determined men could command, scouring the country in 
every direction for a period of nearly a week, but heard 



262 HISTORY OF TEE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

no tidings of Mrs. Eaton and lier children, and were forced 
to give her up as lost. 

This aroused the wrath of the settlers, and many of 
them were for dealing out summary punishment to Hare 
as the instigator; but, in the absence of proof, he was 
not even brought to trial for the Loudenslager murder, 
of which he was clearly guilty. The act, however, put 
people u]3on their guard; the most notorious known tory 
in the county had openly shown his hand, and they knew 
what to expect of him. 

Mr. Eaton — broken-hearted, and almost distracted — 
hunted for years for his wife and children; and, as no 
tidings could be had of them, he was at last reluctantly 
forced to believe that the savages had murdered them. 
Nor was he wrong in his conjecture. Some years after- 
ward the blanched skeletons of the three were found by 
some hunters in the neighborhood of Warrior's Mark. 
The identity of the skeletons was proved by some shreds 
of clothing — which were known to belong to them — still 
clinging to their remains. 

When Captain Blair's rangers, or that portion of them 
raised in Path Valley, came across to the Juniata, they 
had an old drum, and — it is fair to infer, inasmuch as the 
still-house then seemed to be a necessary adjunct of civili- 
zation — sundry jugs of whiskey accompanying them. At 
Jack's Narrows lived a burly old German, named Peter 
Vandevender, who, hearing the noise, came to his door in 
his shirt-sleeves, with a pipe in his mouth. 

"Waas ter tuyfel ish ter meaning of all dish?" inquired 
old Vandervender. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 263 

"We are going to hunt John Weston and his tories," 
said one of the men. 

"Hunt dories, eh? Well, Captin Plair, chust you go 
ant hunt Chack Hare. He ish te tamtest dory in Benn- 
sylvania. He dold Weshton ash he would half a gom- 
pany to help him after he come mit ter Inchins." 

What Vandevender told Blair was probably true to the 
letter; for one of the inducements held out to the tories to 
accompany Weston was that they would be reinforced by 
all the tories in the county as soon as the first blow was 
struck ; but he was not raising a company. He was 
too cowardly to exj^ose himself to the danger attending 
such a proceeding. 

As soon as Vandevender had communicated the fore- 
going, the company, with great unanimity, agreed to pay 
Hare a visit forthwith. The drum was laid aside, and 
the volunteers marched silently to his house. A portion 
of them went into the house, and found Hare, while Blair 
and others searched the barn and outbuildings to find 
more of the tories. On the arrival of Captain Blair at the 
house, some of his men, in a high state of excitement, had 
a rope around Hare's neck, and the end of it thrown over 
a beam, preparatory to hanging him. Blair interposed, 
and with great difficulty prevented them from executing 
summary vengeance upon the tory. In the mean time, one 
of the men sharpened his scalping-knife upon an iron pot, 
walked deliberately up to Hare, and, while two or three 
others held him, cut both Ids ears off close to his liecid! The 
tor}^, during these proceedings, begged most piteously for 
his life — made profuse promises to surrender every thing 
he had to the cause of liberty; but the men regarded his 



264 msTORY OF the juniata valley. 

pleadings as those of a coward, and paid no attention to 
them, and, after cropping him, marched back to Van- 
devender's on their route in search of Weston. 

On their arrival at the Standing Stone, they communi- 
cated to the people at the fort what they had done. The 
residents at the Stone only wanted a j^iece of information 
like this to inflame them still more against Hare, and, 
expressing regrets that he had not been killed, they im- 
mediately formed a plot to go down and despatch him. 
But there were tories at the Stone. Hare soon got wdnd 
of the aftiiir, placed his most valuable effects upon pack- 
horses, and left the country. 

The failure of Weston's expedition, and the treatment 
and flight of Hare, compelled many tories, w^ho had oj)enly 
avowed their sentiments, to leave this section of the 
country, while those who were suspected were forced into 
silence and inactivity, and many openly espoused the 
cause of the colonies. Still, many remained who refused 
to renounce their allegiance to the king, and claimed to 
stand upon neutral ground. Those who had taken up 
arms against Great Britain, however, declared that there 
were but tw^o sides to the question, and no neutral ground ; — 
that those who w^ere not for them were against them. 

Hare wms declared and proclaimed an "attainted 
traitor," and his property was confiscated and sold. Who 
became the purchaser w^e could not ascertain ; but, after 
peace was declared and the treaty between the United 
States and Great Britain ratified. Hare returned, and 
claimed the benefit of that part of the treaty which restored 
their possessions to all those of his Majesty's subjects that 
had not taken up arms against the colonists. As there was 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 265 

no direct evidence that he killed Loudenslager, Congress 
was compelled to purchase back and restore his property 
to him. 

He lived and died on his farm. The venerable Mrs. 
Armitage, the mother-in-law of Senator Cresswell, of Hol- 
lidaysburg, remembers seeing him when she was quite 
young and he an old man. She says he used to conceal 
the loss of his ears by wearing his hair long. 

During life he was shunned, and he died unregretted; 
but, we are sorry to say, his name is perpetuated: the 
place in w^hich he lived, was cropped, and died, and is still 
called Hare's Valley. The people of Huntingdon should 
long since have changed it, and blotted from their memory 
a name linked to infamy and crime. 



2G6 HISTORY OF the juniata valley. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

MOSES DONALDSON — CAPTURE AND MURDER OP HIS WIFE AND TWO 

CHILDREN. 

Moses Donaldson lived in Hartslog settlement, where 
Hatfield's iron-works are now located, near Alexandria. 
In 1777, after the first Indian outrages had been com- 
mitted, the neighboring settlers met, and resolved for their 
better protection to build a stockade fort somewhere near 
the river. After the building was decided upon, the loca- 
tion became a subject of contention — one party wanting 
the fort at Lytle's, another at Donaldson's, and for a while 
party strife ran high. Lytic, however, succeeded in out- 
generalling Donaldson, — not because his location was the 
most eligible, but simply because he was the most popular 
man. The fort was built at Ly tie's, under Donaldson's 
protest, who declared that he never would go into it, — that 
if danger threatened he would fort at Standing Stone, — a 
vow he religiously kept, at the expense of the loss of his 
wife and two children, we regret to say. 

He continued living at his own house until the spring 
of 1778, when Indian alarms became so frequent that he 
removed his family to Huntingdon. In a short time the 
fears of the people were somewhat lulled, and most of them 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 267 

returned to their homes again. Mr. Donaldson, finding 
his farm-work pressing, returned to his home about the 
first of June, and prepared to make hay. 

On the 11th of the month, a girl who was after cows 
discovered in Anderson's bottom, near the mouth of 
Shaver's Creek, an encampment of some five or six Indians. 
Without their discovering her, she made her way back and 
communicated the intelligence, and the news was soon 
circulated among the settlers. The five Indians were 
considered the advance of a large party; otherwise they 
might readily have been cut ofi" by a dozen resolute men. 
Instead of making the least effort to ascertain the number 
of the savages, the people fled to the forts in the utmost 
consternation. 

On the same evening, a convoy of canoes landed at the 
mouth of Shaver's Creek, and the soldiers stopped at an 
old inn on the bank of the creek. They had taken a load 
of supplies to Water Street Landing for the Lead Mine 
Fort, and were returning with lead-ore, consigned to Mid- 
dle town for smelting. The state of affairs was laid before 
the commander of the convoy, and Mr. Anderson pre- 
vailed upon him to stay a day or two, until the alarm had 
subsided. 

On the afternoon of the 12th, Donaldson was warned 
that the Indians had been seen a second time, and advised 
to fort at Lytle's without delay. This he refused to do 
point-blank, but immediately packed up, put his family 
into a canoe, and started for Huntingdon. When he 
reached the mouth of Shaver's Creek, he tied the canoe to 
the root of a tree at the bank of the creek, and went up to 
transact some business with Mr. Anderson, accompanied 



268 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

bj his oldest child — a lad nine or ten years of age, — 
leaving his wife and two younger children in the canoe. 

After an absence of half an hour, the boy returned to the 
canoe 5 but, as he came in sight of it, he observed a number 
of Indians taking his mother and the children out of it. 
He hastened back to the inn and told the soldiers, but 
they considered it a fabrication, and paid no attention to 
what he said. From thence he hastened to Anderson's 
and told his father, who immediately followed him, and 
found it only too true that his family had been abducted — 
that, too, within the hearing, and almost within sight, of 
twelve soldiers. Donaldson went to the inn, and appealed 
to the commandant to start his force in immediate pursuit. 
This, however, w^as found totally impracticable, as they had 
been making a sort of holiday by getting drunk, and were 
unfit for duty of any kind; which was to be regretted, 
for the timely notice of the outrage would easily have 
enabled them, had they been in condition, to overtake the 
savages. 

Early next morning the soldiers started m pursuit in 
one direction, and the people of the settlement formed into 
a strong party and went in another, and in this manner 
the entire countrv was scoured. Toward evening a bon- 
net belonging to one of the children was found in a rye- 
field, near wdiere the Maguire farm now stands, which in- 
dicated the direction the savages had taken. 

Next day the search was resumed and continued until 
night ; but no tidings w^hatever could be obtained of the 
route the savages had taken, and they were finally obliged 
to give them up as lost. 

Several years elapsed before their fate was known. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 269 

Thomas Jolinston and Peter Crum, while hunting up 
Spruce Creek, probably a mile and a half from its mouth, 
came upon the camp of a friendly Indian family, near 
whose wigwam an old woman was engaged in boiling 
sugar, and who informed them that she had long been 
waiting for some white hunters to come up, as she had 
something to show them. She then led the wiiy, and, 
half a mile off, showed them the skeletons of a grown per- 
son and two children. This news was communicated to 
Mr. Donaldson, and he had the skeletons taken to 
Shaver's Creek, with a view of interring them. But here a 
new difficulty arose. Mr. Eaton had not yet recovered 
his family, abducted from Kishicoquillas Valley, and 
there was no reason why these skeletons might not be 
those of his family. The matter was finally determined 
by a weaver, who testified to a piece of Mrs. Donaldson's 
short-gown, found near her remains. 

When we reflect over this act of savage atrocity, w^e 
are free to confess that we look upon it as one of the 
most inhuman and revolting on record. The woman, 
with her two children, taken to a neighboring wood, 
and there, in all probability, tomahawked and scalped 
in succession, — the children witnessing the agony of the 
dying mother, or perhaps the mother a witness to the 
butchery of her helpless offspring, — the very recital chills 
the blood. 

The son, who accompanied his father to Anderson's, 
died at a very advanced age, at or near Lock Haven, a 
year or two ago. 

William Donaldson, of Hollidaysburg, is a son of Moses 
Donaldson by a second wife. 



270 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XXIY. 

DEPREDATIONS AT THE MOUTH OF SPRUCE CREEK — MURDER OP LEVI 
HICKS SCALPING OF HIS CHILD. 

We have already mentioned the Hicks family in a pre- 
ceding chapter, and incidentally mentioned their captivity 
for a number of years among the Indians. We have 
made the most unremitting exertions, yet we have failed 
to ascertain any thing like a satisfactory account of this 
remarkable family. The name of Gersham Hicks figures 
in Miner's "History of Wyoming" as an Indian guide, 
while in the Archives he is noticed as an Indian inter- 
preter, previous to the war of the Revolution. Where 
they were taken, or when released, is not positively 
known. One thing, however, is quite certain : that is, that 
they made themselves masters of both the habits and lan- 
guage of many of the Indians. 

Mrs. Fee thinks they came to Water Street imme- 
diately after their release from captivity, and settled 
there. During their captivity they imbibed the Indian 
habit to such a degree that they wore the Indian costume, 
even to the colored eagle-feathers and little trinkets 
which savages seem to take so much delight in. Gersham 



,, ,,, *i 




HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 271 

and Moses were unmarried, but Levi, the elder, brought 
with him a half-breed as his wife, by whom he had a 
number of children. They all settled at Water Street, 
and commenced the occupation of farming. Subse- 
quently, Levi rented from the Bebaults the tub-mill 
at or near the mouth of Spruce Creek. 

When the Indian troubles commenced in the spring of 
1778, he was repeatedly urged to go either to Ly tie's or 
Lowry's Fort, and let the mill stand until the alarm had 
subsided. Hicks, however, obstinately refused, declaring 
that he was safe. It is thus apparent that he relied upon 
his intimate knowledge of the Indian character and lan- 
guage for safety, in case any of the marauders should find 
their way to what he looked upon as a sort of an out-oJ& 
the-way place, — a fatal case of misplaced confidence, not- 
withstanding it was asserted that the fall previous a party 
had attacked his cabin, and that, on his addressing them 
in their own language, they had desisted. 

On the 12th of May, 1778, Hicks started his mill in 
the morning, as was his usual custom, and then repaired 
to breakfast. While in the house he procured a needle 
and thread, returned to the mill, replenished the hopper, 
and then seated himself near the door and commenced 
mending a moccasin. He had been occupied at this but a 
minute or two before he heard a rustling in the bushes 
some ten or fifteen yards in front of him. The idea of 
there being Indians in the vicinity never entered his 
head; nobody had seen or heard of any in the settlement. 
Consequently, in direct violation of an established custom, 
he walked forward to ascertain the cause of the com- 
motion in the bushes, leaving his rifle leaning against the 



272 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

mill. He advanced but one or two steps before he was 
shot through the heart. 

His wife, who was in the house at the time, hearing the 
ref)ort, ran to the door, and in an instant comprehended 
how matters stood. She opened the back door, ran down 
the river to a fording, crossed over, and, with all the speed 
she could command, hastened over the mountain to Lytle's 
Fort. Near Alexandria she met a man on horseback, 
who, noticing her distracted condition, demanded what the 
matter was. She explained as best she could, when the 
man turned back and rode rapidly toward the fort to apprise 
the people of what had occurred. It was then that the wo- 
man fairly recovered her senses, and, on looking around for 
the first time, she noticed her little son, about ten years old, 
who had followed her. The sight of him reminded her of 
her family of children at home, at the mercy of the savages, 
and all the mother's devotion was aroused within her. She 
picked up her boy, and, exhausted as she was, hastened 
toward the fort wdth him. 

As it subsequently appeared, one of the children of 
Mrs. Hicks, — a girl between three and four years of age, — 
directly after her escape, went out to see her father, just 
while the savages were in the act of scalping him. She 
was too young to comprehend the act clearly, but, seeing 
the blood about his head, she commenced crying, and 
screamed, " My pappy ! my pappy ! what are you doing to 
my poor pappy?" 

One of the Indians drew his tomahawk from his belt 
and knocked the child down, after which he scalped it; 
and, without venturing to the house, the savages departed. 
Mrs. Hicks reached the fort, and the news of the murder 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 273 

soon spread over the country, but the usual delays occurred 
in getting up a scout to follow the marauders. Some de- 
clared their unwillingness to go unless there was a large 
force, as the depredators might only be some stragglers 
belonging to a large jparty; others, that their rifles were 
out of order; and others again pleaded sickness. In this 
way the day slipped around, and in the mean time the 
savages got far beyond their reach, even in case the scout 
could have been induced to follow them. 

Next morning, however, a party mustered courage and 
went over to the mill, where they found Hicks scalped on 
the spot where he fell, and his rifle gone. 

The inside of the house presented one of the saddest 
spectacles ever witnessed in the annals of savage atrocities. 
Two of the children were lying upon the floor crying, and 
the infant in the cradle, for the want of nourishment had 
apparently cried until its crying had subsided into the 
most pitiful meanings; while the little girl that had 
been scalped sat crouched in a corner, gibbering like 
an idiot, her face and head covered with dry clotted 
blood! 

Of course, considering the start the Indians had, it was 
deemed useless to follow them; so they buried Hicks near 
the mill, and removed the family to the fort. 

It may seem a little singular, nevertheless it is true, that 
the child, in spite of its fractured skull and the loss of its 
scalp, actually recovered, and lived for a number of years 
after the outrage, although its wounds were never dressed 
by a physician. It was feeble-minded, however, owing to 
the fracture. 

18 



274 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

As no other family resided near the mill, no person 
could be induced to take it after Hicks was murdered, 
and it stood idle for years. 

The murder of Hicks created the usual amount of 
alarm, but no depredations followed in the immediate 
neighborhood for some time after his death. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 275 



CHAPTER XXV. 

STONE VALLEY — McCORMICK's FORT — MURDER OP MRS. HOUSTON AND 
JAMES McCLEES — A DEALER IN GRAIN OF THE OLDEN TIME. 

In consequence of the rumors so rife in 1778 of the 
country being filled with Indians, the people of Stone 
Vallejj north of Huntingdon, determined to build a fort. 
While concerting the measures for its erection, a Mr. 
McCormick stated that, inasmuch as the population of the 
valley was not very large, and the labor and expense attend- 
ing the erection of a fortress very great, he would agree that 
his house should be put into repair, pierced for defence, and 
that the people should fort with him. This proposition was 
eagerly accepted by the people, who went willingly to work ; 
and in a very short time his house was converted into Fort 
McCormick, into which nearly all the settlers of Stone 
Valley fled at once. 

Among others who took up their residence there was 
an old lady named Houston, who had resided some seven 
miles up the valley. She was a very amiable old lady, 
though somewhat garrulous, for which some of the settlers 
were disposed to ridicule her. It appears she had a small 
patch of flax out, which gave her more trouble than a 
hundred acres of wheat would occasion some men. She 



276 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

was constantly lamenting the certain loss of her flax, until 
the very word flax got to be a byword. As the time for 
pulling the flax approached, the old woman importuned 
every man in the fort to accompany her to her house only 
for a day, but her appeals were all in vain ; some declared 
they would not go so far from the fort for a ten-acre 
field of flax, while an old soldier intimated that he would 
be pretty sure to be flaxed if he went. In short, her re- 
quest was treated as a jest. Nevertheless, the old woman 
indulged some sort of a vague hope that somebody would 
help her out of her difficulty, and she continued talking 
about the flax. 

One morning, about the middle of August, a number 
of men were seated in front of the fort, when some one 
started the ever laughable theme of the old woman's flax- 
patch; and, while conversing with the usual levity uj)on 
the old woman's trials, a young man, named James Mc- 
Clees, joined the party. After listening to them some 
time, he got up and said — 

" Boj's, it is bad enough to be too cowardlj^ to help the 
old woman gather her flax ; to ridicule her misfortune is 
a shame." 

" If you think it is cowardly, why don't you go and 
help her pull it?" said one of the men, who w^as evidenth^ 
piqued at what had been said. 

"That is just my intention," said he. " Mrs. Houston, 
get ready, and I'll go with you to j)ull your flax." 

The dream was at last to be realized, and the old 
woman's heart was overflowing with gratitude. In a few 
moments she was ready. McClees shouldered his rifle, 
and the two departed — alas ! to return no more. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 277 

McClees was but eighteen years of age, but extremely 
well-proportioned, and his vocabulary knew no such word 
as fear. Sad fate, that his noble and generous impulses 
should have been the means of cutting him off in the 
very flower of youth ! 

Of the manner of his death there was no living wit- 
ness to speak ; but on and around his body, when found, 
there were unmistakable signs of such actions as are sup- 
posed to speak as plain as words. 

Both had promised to return to the fort in the evening, 
or the evening following at farthest. The first evening 
passed, and they came not; the second evening, and still 
no sign of them. This created alarm, and the necessary 
arrangements were made to go in search of them. 

As soon as the ordinary duty of the morning was per- 
formed, as many armed men as it was deemed safe to 
spare were sent up the Valley. When they arrived at 
Mrs. Houston's house they found all quiet, and no signs 
of either Mrs. Houston or McClees having been there. 
They then started up the hill-side, toward the flax-patch; 
but before they reached it they found the dead body of 
Mrs. Houston. She had been killed apparently by cuts 
from a hatchet on the forehead, and her scalp was taken 
off. The flax was untouched, which rendered it probable 
that she was attacked and killed while on her way to the 
patch. 

A hundred yards farther on lay McClees, literally co- 
vered with blood, and stabbed and cut in every part of his 
body. As there were no bullet-wounds upon him, it was 
evident that the fight was a hand-to-hand encounter, and 
the struggle must have been a long, fearful, and bloody one. 



278 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

That McClees had sold his life dearly was also very ap- 
parent. His rifle was gone; but by his side lay his knife, 
bloody, and the jioint broken off. Near him lay a toma- 
hawk, also bloody, and the ground was clotted with blood 
for a circuit of twenty yards. In addition to these, eagle- 
feathers, beads, and shreds of buckskin, were found lying 
about where the struggle had taken place. 

The nature of this fearful fight could only be guessed 
at by these tokens ; but the true state of it was revealed 
in a few years after; for within a mile of where the 
struggle took place, on the bench of the mountain, two 
hunters found the remains of three Indians covered with 
bark. The supposition was that McClees had been at- 
tacked by five of them, and killed two outright and 
mortally wounded a third before they despatched him. 

A hero such as this brave youth proved himself in that 
desperate encounter certainly deserved a better fate. 

In concluding our reminiscences of Stone Valley we 
cannot omit giving an anecdote, characteristic of the 
times, told us by an old friend. 

Far up Stone Creek lived an old gentleman named 
O'Burn. In 1777, being a thrifty farmer, he raised 
nearly a thousand bushels of wheat. The year following, 
times became very hard — wheat was high, and com- 
manded a price which placed it almost beyond the 
reach of poor men. The fact that O'Burn had a large 
quantity of wheat attracted to his house numerous 
customers; and the manner in which he dealt with 
them may be inferred from the following: — 

A man reputed to be rich rode up to his house, when 
Mr. O'Burn made his appearance in the doorway. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 279 

"Mr. O'Burn, have you any wheat?" 

"Plenty of it. Have you the money to pay for it?" 

" Certainly." 

"A horse to carry it, and bags to put it in, I see." 

"Oh, yes; every thing," said the stranger. 

"Well, then," replied O'Burn, "you can go to Big 
Valley for your wheat; mine is for people who have 
no money to pay, no bags to put it in, and no horses 
to carry it oft'!" 

We regret to say that the race of O'Burns became 
extinct some years ago. 



280 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

TUCKAHOE — MURDER OF JOHN GUILLIFORD. 

In the Valley of Tuckalioe, stretching from Altoona to 
the mouth of the Bald Eagle, there were some depre- 
dations committed, but never any of a very serious 
nature, except upon one occasion. The cause of this 
can be traced, in a great measure, to the fact that Thomas 
and Michael Coleman and Michael Wallack lived in the 
upper end of the valley. These men were so well known 
and so much feared by the Indians, that, although the 
Kittaning Path, leading to the Bald Eagle Valley, ran 
directly through Tuckahoe, they always avoided it, for 
fear of finding those old and experienced hunters am- 
buscaded along their route. Besides, Captain Logan, a 
friendly chief, lived for some years in what is now known 
as Logan's Valley. He was also known and feared, and 
he was constantly on the watch to guard against the 
incursions of hostile savages. Add to this the fact that 
the valley was thinly populated, and the risk attending 
the hunting for scalps immeasurably great, small roving 
parties, on but two or three occasions, made their appear- 
ance in Tuckahoe. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 281 

In the fall of 1777, two savages took captive two chil- 
dren while at play, near a cabin located somewhere in 
the neighborhood of where Mr. Hutchinson now lives. 
Thomas Coleman happened to be out hunting, and saw 
them come up the path. Each one was carrying a child, 
but neither of them had fire-arms, so that he felt quite at 
ease. From behind the tree where he stood, he might 
easily have shot one of the savages, but he w^ould not run 
the risk for fear of hitting the child ; so, waiting until they 
had passed him, he jumped into the path, levelled his 
gun at them, and shouted ^^ surrender T The affrighted 
savages dropped the children and disappeared in the 
woods. 

On another occasion they entered the valley, stole three 
horses, and set fire to a stable. A number of pioneers 
tracked them through the old war-path to the top of the 
mountain; which was quite as far as it was prudent to 
venture, as that was considered the line dividing the 
white settlements from the Indian country. 

The only massacre in Tuckahoe ever committed by 
the savages took place in the summer of 1778. A man 
named John Guilliford cleared a small patch of land a 
short distance south of where Blair Furnace now stands, 
and erected his cabin near where John Trout's house is. 
In the spring of 1778, he abandoned his ground and cabin 
after the first alarm of Indian depredations, and sought 
safety in Fetter's Fort. In the course of the summer, 
after the alarm had somewhat subsided, Guilliford went 
down to see how his crops were progressing. His body 
was found the same day by Coleman and Milligan. It 
was lying at the threshold of his cabin door; so that, in 



282 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

all probability, he was shot just as he was coining out of 
his house. Coleman and Milligan dug a grave near the 
hut, and buried him as he was, without a coffin. The 
most remarkable feature about this murder was that 
GuilHford was not scalped. When we remember that 
scalps were paid for at the British garrison at Detroit, 
the omission to seal]) Guilliford appears almost inex- 
plicable. Coleman and Milligan went in search of the 
Indians, but did not succeed in getting upon their trail. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 283 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

EARLY SETTLEMENT OP SCOTCH VALLEY — THE MOORE FAMILY — MASSA- 
CRE OF WILLIAM MOORE — INDIAN SHOT BY A BOY, ETC. 

The Moore family, whose name is identified with 
Scotch Valley as the original settlers, came to this coun- 
try probably about the year 1768, from Scotland. It 
consisted of Samuel Moore, his seven sons and two 
daughters, — viz. : Daniel, William, John, Samuel, James, 
David, Joseph, Elizabeth, and Jane. Their first stopping- 
place in the interior was in Kishicoquillas Valley, where 
the hardy Scots commenced clearing land; but the yield 
not being such as they were led to expect, the two elder 
brothers, Daniel and William, were sent abroad by the 
old patriarch to look for better land and more of it. 
Accordingly, they shaped their course westward, prospect- 
ing as they went, until they reached what is now known 
as Scotch Valley. How they found their way to that 
place, an unbroken wilderness, five miles from the nearest 
human habitation, or what the inducements were for stop- 
ping there, were puzzling questions then. Let the reader 
noic look at the fine farms of Scotch Valley, and he will 
see that, in selecting the spot, the Moores were actuated 
by a sagacity that enabled them to see those fine lands 



284 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

blooming like the rose in tlie future. They immediately 
occupied a large tract of land, built a cabin, and commenced 
clearing. The year following they went to Kishicoquil- 
las, and brought on the father and the remainder of the 
family. 

Beneath their sturdy blows the giant oaks fell, and the 
wilderness was turned into fields of waving grain, and they 
soon had a home that made them even forge^ the High- 
lands of Scotland. 

When the war broke out they were all stanch repub- 
licans, active and energetic men, and w^ere foremost in all 
measures of defence for the frontier. 

William Moore, second son of Samuel, a useful man, 
loved and respected by all who knew him, met his death 
at the hands of an Indian, in August, 1778. It appears 
that one morning two of their horses were missing, when 
William and a lad named George McCartney, about four- 
teen years of age, started in pursuit of them — as a matter 
of course not neglecting the caution of the day, to take 
their rifles with them. At that time two paths led to 
Fetter's Fort from Scotch Valley, — one by way of Franks- 
town, through Adam Holliday's farm, fording the river 
near where the plank-road bridge now crosses south of 
HoUidaysburg; the other led through the flat, back of the 
Presbyterian graveyard, and north of HoUidaysburg. 
This was the most direct route ; but, in order to make a 
thorough research, they went by way of the river road, 
and reached Fetter's Fort without obtaining any tidings 
of the missing animals. After remaining at the fort a 
short time, they started on their way home by the back or 
direct road. No Indians having been seen in the country 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 285 

for some time, they travelled on with a feeling of entire 
security, and never for a moment entertained the re- 
motest idea of coming in contact Avith savages. When 
they came to a pile of drift-wood, — in what is now known 
as McCahen's Bottom, half a mile west of HoUidaysburg, — 
while Moore was in the act of trying to get over the drift, 
he was shot by an Indian from an ambuscade. The bullet 
entered his back, passed through the left ventricle of the 
heart, and he fell dead against the drift. 

McCartney, who was some distance off, on the impulse 
of the moment commenced running. In the mean time 
the Indian had come from his place of concealment, and, 
seeing him, drew his tomahawk and followed. McCart- 
ney soon finding that the savage was the fleetest, and must 
overtake him, cocked his gun while running, suddenly 
wheeled, and aimed at the Indian. This unexpected de- 
fence from a mere boy rather took the Indian by surprise, 
and he jumped behind a tree, and McCartney did the 
same, still keeping the aim ready to shoot in case the 
Indian moved from the cover of the tree. While in this 
position, the Indian commenced loading his rifle, and, 
after ramming home the powder, he accidentally dropped 
his ramrod, which he stooped to pick up ; in doing which 
he exposed his posterior, which McCartney took advan- 
tage of, and fired. The Indian gave a scream of mingled 
rage and pain, dropped his rifle, and ran, picking up leaves 
on his way, which he endeavored to thrust into the bullet- 
hole to stanch the blood. 

Young McCartney, satisfied with the exploit, and 
thankful that his life had been spared, did not pursue the 
savage. His first impulse was to do so; but fearing that 



286 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

the chase might lead him into an encampment of the 
enemy, since it invariably turned out that Avhere there 
was one more were not far off, he returned with all 
despatch to Fetter's Fort. The men at the fort had 
heard both shots, but supposed that Moore and McCart- 
ney had started game of some kind ; consequently, they 
were unprepared for any news of the kind. Fortunately, 
there happened to be a very large force at Fetter's at the 
time, and, under the impression that there must be more 
Indians in the neighborhood, a strong, experienced force 
at once started out. 

When they arrived- at the drift, they found the body of 
Moore, stark in death, leaning against it, with his rifle 
grasped in his uplifted hands, as if in the very act of try- 
ing to climb over. His body was removed to the fort by 
some of the men, while the remainder commenced search- 
ing for the Indian. By his blood they tracked him nearly 
a mile up the run, and even found a place where he had 
evidently stopped to wash the blood off; but at length 
they lost all traces of his trail. They continued their 
march, however, to Gap Run, in order to ascertain whether 
there was any fresh Indian trail. In their conjectures 
that there were other Indians near they were not mis- 
taken. Half a mile west of where Hutchinson's Mill now 
stands, they found traces of a fresh encampment of a very 
large party, Avhose trail they followed several miles up the 
Kittaning War-Path; but they soon abandoned all hope 
of overtaking them, and returned to the fort. 

The dead body of the Indian shot by McCartney was 
found, some time afterward, by a Mr. Hileman, up Kit- 
taning Run, where he had secreted himself by the side of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 287 

of a log, under some bushes, and completely covered him- 
self with brush and leaves previous to giving up the 
ghost, in order to prevent the whites from finding his 
body. The ruling passion was strong even in death ! 

His rifle, which was kept at Fetter's, as a trophy, was 
a brass-barrelled smooth-bore, with the British coat of 
arms stamped upon it, — conclusive evidence that the entire 
savage band had been armed and equipped by his Ma- 
jesty's officers at Detroit, and were on a scalp-hunting 
expedition. 

During the troubles of 1779-80, when the frontier-men 
fled before the assaults and merciless massacres of the In- 
dians, the Moores returned to their former residence in 
Kishicoquillas. But the restless Scots did not remain 
away from their farm long. Some of them returned in a 
year; but the old patriarch, Samuel, did not return until 
after the surrender of Cornwallis. He was then accom- 
panied by a colony of Scotchmen, consisting of the Craw- 
fords, Irwins, Fraziers, Stewarts, and Macphersons, and 
others, constituting from twenty-five to thirty persons. 

The late Mr. Maguire, then quite a lad, was at Shaver's 
Creek when they passed on their way west. They were 
all in full Highland costume, with bonnet and kilt, armed 
with claymores and Queen Anne muskets. He had seen 
Indians before, but never any Highlanders, and, while 
Hstening to their Gaelic dialect, he wondered to himself 
what tribe they belonged to. 

These men settled in the upper end of the valley; 
hence the name — " Scotch Valley." By their sinewy arms 
and sturdy blows the oaks of the forest fell, and by their 
unremitting toil to gain a home in the New World they 



288 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

encountered and tiiumplied over the most formidable 
obstacles, until the valle}^ — its natural soil taken into con- 
sideration — became one of the finest of its size in the 
country. 

The Moore family were the first persons who con- 
ceived the idea of running arks down the river from 
Frankstown. This they accomplished successfully before 
the close of the last century, and afterward engaged in 
running flat-boats between Frankstown and Middletown. 

Of the third generation of the Moore famil}- but three 
remain in this vicinity, — viz. : T. B. Moore, in Hollidays- 
burg; Jesse Moore, at the old homestead, in Scotch Vallej^; 
and Johnston Moore, in Ebensburg. Others, however, live 
in the West; and the fourth generation, whose number Ave 
are not able to compute, are scattered over the Union. 

The descendants of the men who wound their way up 
the Juniata, in Highland costume, nearly three-quarters 
of a century ago, with all their worldly possessions upon 
pack-horses, are also numerous; and many of them have 
risen to wealth and eminence by their OAvn unaided 
exertions. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 289 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

WOODCOCK VALLEY — MASSACRE OP ELDER — THE BRECKENRIDGB 
FAMILY — FIGHT WITH, AND DESTRUCTION OF, CAPTAIN PHILLIPS's 
SCOUT BY THE INDIANS — CRUEL MASSACRE OF TEN MEN. 

Woodcock Valley,, located north of Huntingdon, is one 
of the oldest-settled valleys in the county. In the days 
of Indian depredations, it was a favorite haunt of the 
savage, whose great war-path from the West to the East 
went through a part of it. 

The first murder committed in it during the Revolu- 
tionary struggle occurred at Coffey Run, near the present 
residence of Mr. Entriken. The victim was a man 
named Elder, the husband of the woman mentioned in a 
preceding chapter as having been carried a captive to 
Detroit by the Indians. As there is no living witness 
who was present, the circumstances connected with his 
massacre are merely traditionary. He was on his way 
home in company with Richard Shirley, when he was 
shot and scalped ; in which condition he was found by a 
scouting party a day or two after the occurrence. This 
was in 1778, and the same year a number of captives 
were taken from the valley; but the accounts are so 

vague that we can give no reliable data. 

19 



290 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

The Breckenridge family lived about three miles south- 
east of McCoiinelstown, on the road which now leads from 
Huntingdon to Bedford, on the farm at present occupied 
by Ludwig Hoover. The family consisted of the father, 
mother, two sons, — John and Thomas, aged respectively 
eighteen and sixteen years, — a girl aged fourteen, another 
aged three years, and an infont at the breast. They had, 
during the alarms of massacres, forted at Hartsock's Fort, 
Avhicli was almost in sightof their farm; but in the spring 
of 1779, the alarm having in a great measure subsided, 
they, as well as the rest of the settlers, went home, and 
the fort was abandoned, under the full impression that the}^ 
would have no further use for it, — that Indian depreda- 
tions were ended. In this they were most signally mis- 
taken. 

In July — probably about the middle of the month, — 
one morning, directly after breakflist, the sons, John and 
Thomas, started in search of a horse that had broken 
from his enclosure the night previous. After they had 
gone, the old lady occupied herself in her household duties, 
while the oldest daughter repaired to the spring-house in 
the meadow, — a distance of probably five hundred yards 
from the house, — for the purpose of churning. While en- 
gaged in this occupation, she was suddenly confronted by 
dive Indians. Probably overcome by fright, she made no 
eifort to escape, but screamed at the top of her voice. 
The father, without suspecting the real cause of the diffi- 
culty, started, unarmed, in the direction of the spring- 
house, and when within twenty yards of it a bullet from 
one of the Indian rifles struck him, and he fell dead in 
Ihe path. Mrs. Breckenridge was looking out of the 



HISTORY OP THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 291 

window at the time, and, fearing that their next move 
would be in the direction of the house, she snatched the 
infant out of the cradle, and, taking in her arms the other 
child, escaped. Instinctively she took the path toward 
Standing Stone, — a direction in wdiich the Indians were not 
likely to follow. She pursued the path along Crooked 
Run for a few miles, and then sank exhausted upon the 
ground. As soon as she rallied, she endeavored to con- 
tinue her way to the Stone; but to her dismay she found 
that she had wandered from the path and was lost. In 
this condition, she wandered about the woods with her 
children the whole day and the entire night. Next day, 
the oldest child complained bitterly of hunger, when 
the mother fortunately came to a rye-field. The rye 
was just beginning to head, in spots, and she gathered 
a number of heads, rubbed out the kernels, and gave 
them to the child. As the operation was a tedious one, 
in consequence of the scarcity of the grain, she took off 
her under-garment, wrapped up the infant and laid it 
down, and went to work to procure sufficient to appease 
the appetite of the child, and while so engaged she un- 
consciously wandered a considerable distance from the 
infant. 

John and Thomas returned to the house with the 
horses late in the afternoon ; and, seeing their father and 
sister murdered, believed that the mother, with the other 
children, had either met the same fate or been carried 
into captivity. They lost no time in making their way to 
Standing Stone Fort, where they communicated the sad 
intelligence. By that time it was nearly dark, and en- 
tirely too late to maKe any further effort j but at the 



292 HISTORY OF THE JU^^IATA VALLEY. 

dawn of day, next morning, a posse of men went to Breck- 
enridge's house, where the murdered father and daughter 
lay, and, while part of the people employed themselves in 
removing the bodies preparatory to burial, another party 
scoured the country in search of the mother, being en- 
couraged to do so by seeing her tracks leading toward 
Crooked Run. Late in the afternoon they found her, at 
the edge of the rye-field, leading her child; but the 
anguish she had endured had in a measure unsettled 
her mind, and she was unable to tell where she had 
left the infant. It was deemed advisable to remove her 
to the fort. By next day, she had so far recovered as to 
be able to state that she left the infant in the field; 
whereupon a party set out, and returned with it in the 
evening. 

The infant had apparently not suffered a great deal, 
except from the anno3'ance of flies. Its entire face wcis fiy- 
hloivn; and yet, strange to say, she recovered, grew to be a 
strong, healthy woman, got married, and was the mother 
of Isaac B. Meek, Esq., formerly a member of the legis- 
lature from Centre county, and, we are told, died but a few 
years ago. 

John Breckenridge became a distinguished Presbyterian 
preacher. Mr. Maguire was under the impression that he 
located amonsj his relatives in Kentuckv; but Dr. Junkin, 
of Hollidaysburg, whose knowledge of church history can- 
not be questioned, informs us that he officiated for many 
years in the first Presbyterian church ever built in Wash- 
ington City. 

Woodcock Valley was the scene of the massacre of 
Captain Phillips's scout, — one of thje most cruel and cold- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 293 

blooded murders on record, — a massacre which hurried 
into eternity ten as brave men as ever ranged the woods 
of the Juniata Valley. 

The following is Colonel Piper's official report of the 
massacre, made to President Reed. It contains no par- 
ticulars, and is also inaccurate; nevertheless, we deem it 
worthy of a place, as it bears an official stamp. We copy 
it from the Archives of 1780: — 

Bedford County, August 6, 1780. 

Sir : — Your favor of the third of June, with the blank com- 
missions, have been duly received ; since which we have been 
anxiously employed in raising our quota of Pennsylvania volun- 
teers, and at the same time defending our frontiers. But, in our 
present shattered situation, a full company cannot be expected 
from this county, when a number of our militia companies are 
entirely broken up and whole townships laid waste, so that the 
communication betwixt our upper and lower districts is entirely 
broken, and our iipprehonsions ot" immediate danger are not lessened, 
but greatly aggiavated by a most alarming stroke. Captain 
Phillips, an experienced, good woodman, had engaged a company 
of rangers for the space of tAvo months, for the defence of our 
frontiers, was surprised at his fort on Sunday, the 16th of July, 
when the captain, with eleven of his company, were all taken and 
killed. When I received the intelligence, which was the day fol- 
lowing, I marched, with only ten men, directly to the place, where 
we found the house burnt to ashes, with sundry Indian tomahawks 
that had been lost in the action, but found no person killed at that 
place ; but, upon taking the Indian tracks, within about one half- 
mile we found ten of Captain Phillips's company, with their hands 
tied, and murdered in the most cruel manner. 

This bold enterprise so alarmed the inhabitants that our whole 
frontiers were upon the point of giving way; but, upon application 
to the Lieutenant of Cumberland county, he hath sent to our 
assistance one company of the Pennsylvania volunteers, which, 
with the volunteers raised in our own county, hath so encouraged 
the inhabitants that they seem determined to stand it a little 



294 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA YALLET. 

longer. We liope our conduct will receive your approbation ; and 
you'll please to approve it by sending your special order to our 
county commissioner to furnish these men Avith provisions and 
other necessaries until such times as other provisions can be made 
for our defence. As Colonel Smith will deliver this, I beg leave to 
recommend you to him, as he is very capable to give full satisfaction 
to you, in every particular, of our present circumstances. 
I have the honor to be, 

With all due respect, 

Your Excellency's most ob't 

And very humble servant, 

John Piper. 

Overlooking the fact that Colonel Piper, in this semi- 
official statement, did not even condescend to mention the 
name of a single one of the brave men who fell by the 
hands of the ruthless savages, is it not a little strange 
that the whole report should be filled with gross inaccu- 
racies, not the least of which is that Captain Phillips was 
killed, when it is notorious that he returned after the 
war — having been taken prisoner, — and people are still 
living in the valley who saw him many years after the 
massacre of his scout? 

Captain Phillips, previous to the disaster, resided near 
what is now Williamsburg. He was a man of some 
energy, and a skilful and experienced woodman. He 
had made a temporary fortress of his house, to guard 
against savage incursions, and his usefulness in protecting 
the frontier was duly appreciated by the settlers. Through 
the influence of some of the most jDrominent men about 
Clover Creek, Colonel Piper was induced to give Mr. 
Phillips a captain's commission, with authority to raise a 
company of rangers to serve for two months, as it was 
known that there was a large body of savages somewhere 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 295 

in the valley, unmistakeable traces of their presence 
having been seen at many places along the river. 

Captain Phillips commenced recruiting men immediately 
on the reception of his commission ; but, owing to the fact 
that it was just the beginning of harvest, he met with 
very little success. By the 15th of July, 1780, he had 
but ten men collected; but with these he determined to 
scout through Woodcock Valley and the Cove, in order to 
protect the farmers in harvesting their grain. To this end 
he distributed ammunition and provisions, and the party 
marched from the Cove across the mountain. On entering 
the valley, they found most of the houses abandoned, but 
no signs of Indians. Late on Saturday evening they 
arrived at the house of one Frederick Heater, which had 
been abandoned by its owner. The house had been 
pierced with loopholes, to serve as a temporary fortress in 
case of necessity, but the proprietor, unable to find suffi- 
cient men to garrison it, had fled to Hartsock's Fort. At 
this house Captain Phillips determined to remain over 
Sunday. The entire force consisted of Captain Phillips, 
his son Elijah, aged fourteen yelirs, Philip Skelly, Hugh 
Skelly, P. and T. Sanders, Richard Shirley, M. Davis, 
Thomas Gaitrell, Daniel Kelly, and two men whose 
names are no longer remembered. After partaking of 
their supper they all stretched themselves out on the floor 
and slept soundly until morning. While preparing their 
morning meal, one of the Skellys happened to open the 
door, when he discovered that the house was surrounded by 
Indians. A glance sufficed to show Captain Phillips how 
matters stood. There were not less than sixty Indians, 
and among them two white men, dressed, decorated, and 



296 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

painted, the same as the savages. The captain at first 
supposed they were marauders, and would probably not 
stop ; but the hope was most delusive. A small shower of 
rain having fallen the day previous, this savage war-party 
had tracked Phillips and his men to the very door of 
Heater's house. Phillips commanded the utmost silence, 
and awaited with breathless anxiety the further move- 
ments of the enemy. Through the window he discovered 
the savages grouped upon an eminence — some ten of them 
armed with rifles, and the remainder with bows and 
arrows — in consultation. Directly one of the savages 
fired his rifle, which was evidently a ruse to draw the men 
from the house ; but it did not succeed. At last one of 
the Indians ventured within rifle-range of the house, 
when Gaitrell, unable to resist the temptation, thrust the 
muzzle of his rifle through one of the loopholes, fired, and 
shot him through the left shoulder. The w^ar-whoop was 
then raised, and the savages ran to and fro for a while, 
concealing themselves behind trees, some seventy yards 
from the house, under the impression probably that an 
immediate action would take place. 

No further demonstrations being made by the rangers, 
the Indians waited but a short time until, at a precon- 
certed signal, they fired a volley at the door and window 
of the house, both of which were riddled by the bullets, 
but no person was injured. The scout, in this agony of 
suspense, surrounded by a large body of savages, with the 
greatest bravery stood at the loopholes, and whenever a 
savnge showed himself within rifle-range he was shot at. 
In this manner two were killed and two wounded. The In- 
dians, in the mean time, continued firing at the door and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 297 

window; and in this way the fight continued until about 
the middle of the afternoon, when Philip Skelly shot the 
chief through the left cheek at a distance of nearly a 
hundred yards. This so exasperated the Indians that they 
raised the war-whoop a second time, loud and fierce, and 
appeared determined to have vengeance. 

At this juncture an occurrence took place which seems 
almost incredible; yet Captain Phillips, whose statement 
we are giving, vouched for the truth of it, and he was 
unquestionably a man of veracity. Davis had the muzzle 
of his rifle out of a loop-hole, and was intently watching 
for a chance to shoot, when he felt a sudden jarring of 
the rifle. He withdrew it, and found a sharp-pointed, 
tapering hickory arrow driven into the muzzle so tight 
that it took the combined eflbrts of four men to withdraw 
it. Whether this new method of spiking a gun was in- 
tentional or not, it illustrated most forcibly the wonderful 
power of the Indian over the bow — whether he fired at 
the rifle or the loop-hole. 

The Indians, finding it impossible to dislodge the 
rangers from what appeared a stronghold in every sense 
of the word, by all stratagems yet used, affixed dry leaves 
and other combustible matter to arrows, set fire to them, 
and lodged them upon the roof of the house, which soon 
was on fire in two or three places. The men carried up 
all the water in the house, and subdued the flames from 
the inside ; but the water was soon exhausted, and a fresh 
volley of the fire-arrows set the roof in a blaze, and there 
were no longer means within their reach to quench the 
destructive element. Still the rangers stood at the loop- 
holes, even when the upper part of the house was all on 



298 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

fire. Certain cleatli stared them in the face : they dared 
not go out of the house, for they would expose the weak- 
ness of their force and meet instant destruction as soon 
as they passed over the threshold; on the other hand, 
the fire above them w^as raging, and they did not know 
what moment they would be buried beneath the burning 
timbers. And 3'et the men never flinched. But, at last. 
Captain Phillips, seeing the desperate strait to which they 
were reduced, cried for quarter, and told the savages that 
he would surrender, on condition that his men should be 
treated as prisoners and not injured. To this the Indians 
assented, and the men escaped from the house just in time 
to save their lives from fire, but only to meet a death 
equally shocking. 

The spokesman for the Indians — one of the white rene- 
gades — demanded, in the first place, that all their arms 
should be delivered up. To this the men readily agreed; 
and they handed their rifles and knives to the savages. 
The next demand was that they should suffer themselves 
to be pinioned, in order that none might escape. This 
degrading proposition met no favor with the men; but 
they were compelled to submit, and their hands were 
secured behind their backs by strong thongs. In this con- 
dition they started — as the Indians said — for Kittaning; 
but, after getting half a mile from the house, some five or 
six of the Indians, who had Captain Phillips and his son 
in charge, continued on their route, while the remainder 
ordered a halt. The ten men were then tied to as many 
saplings, and two or three volleys of arrows were fired 
into them. 

The fate of the scout was not known until Tuesday. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 299 

Some persons jDassing Heater's house on Mondaj' morning, 
seeing it in ruins, carried the news to Hartsock's Fort. 
An express was sent to Colonel Piper, who arrived on the 
ground with a small force late on Tuesday. About the 
house they found a number of tomahawks, knives, and 
ether articles, which indicated that an action had taken 
place; but the fate of the men could not be conjectured. 

Finally, some one discovered the tracks, and proposed 
following them, which they did, and found the men at 
the place designated, each man with from three to five 
arrows sticking in him. Some of them had not been 
killed outright, and it was apparent that their struggles 
to get loose must have been most desperate. Kelly was 
one of these, who, in his efforts to free himself, had buried 
the thong in the flesh of his arm. All of the men were 
scalped. They were buried on the spot where they ap- 
peased the savage appetite for blood; and their moulder- 
ing bones still repose there, without even the rudest of 
stones to commemorate the sad event or perpetuate their 
memory. 

Phillips, in consequence of his rank, was taken prisoner, 
as at that time officers brought to the British garrison 
commanded an excellent price. Himself and son were 
taken to Detroit, and from thence to Montreal, and did 
not reach their home until peace was declared. 

Some of the friends of the persons massacred were dis- 
posed to find fault with Captain Phillips, especially as the 
massacre was so general and yet he and his son had es- 
caped. Of course, Phillips not being present to defend him- 
self, the talk was so much on one side that some went so 
far as to stigmatize him as a traitor and a coward. On his 



300 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

return, he gave the true version of the affair; and it must 
be admitted by all that, under the circumstances, he did 
all that a brave officer could do to save the lives of his 
men. Their fate weighed heavily on his mind for the 
balance of his life ; and in the thought of their untimely 
end he forgot all the sufferings and privations he endured 
while a prisoner in the camp of the enemy. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 301 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

WATER STREET — THE BEATTY FAMILY — CAPTAIN SIMONTON MASSACRE 

OP THE DEAN FAMILY — CAPTIVITY OP JOHN SIMONTON, ETC. 

Water Street is an old place, and was settled prior to 
the Revolution. A stream of water from the Canoe Moun- 
tain, supposed to be the Arch Spring of Sinking Valley, 
passes down a ravine and empties into the Juniata at this 
place. For some distance through a narrow defile, the 
road passed directly through the bed of this stream, — a 
circumstance which induced the settlers to call it Water 
Street when the original settlement was made. 

This for a long time was an important point, being the 
canoe-landing for the interior country. Hence the name 
of Canoe Valley, applied to the country now known as 
Catharine towuiship, in Blair county. At this place was 
General Roberdeau's landing, where he received his stores 
for the lead mines, and where he shipped the lead-ore to 
be taken to Middletown for smelting. 

The number of persons living about Water Street and 
in the lower end of Canoe Valley, during the Revolution, 
was fully as great as at the present da}^ 

Among the first settlers was Patrick Beatty. He was 
the father of seven sons, regular flowers of the forest, who 



302 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

never would fort during all the troubles, and who cared 
no more for an Indian than they did for a bear. They 
lived in a cabin about a mile wxst of Water Street. 

It is related of John, the oldest son, that, coming through 
the woods one day, near his home, he met two Indians 
in his path. They both aimed at him, but by successful 
dodging he prevented them from shooting, and reached 
the house. He found one of his brothers at home ; and 
the two, seizing their rifles, started out after the Indians, 
and followed them sixty miles, frequently getting sight 
of them, but never within shooting distance. The Indians 
knew the Beattj's, and feared them, for a more daring and 
reckless party of young fellows never existed in the valley. 

It is a remarkable coincidence that of the Beattys there 
were seven brothers, seven brothers of the Cryders, 
seven of the Ricketts, seven of the Rollers, and seven of 
the Moores, — constituting the most formidable force of 
active and daring frontier-men to be found between 
Standing Stone and the base of the mountain. 

In the winter of 1778 or the spring of 1779, Lowry's 
Fort was erected, about two and a half or three miles 
west of Water Street, for the protection of the settlers of 
Water Street and Canoe Valley. Although built upon 
Lowry's farm, Captain Simonton was by unanimous con- 
sent elected the commander. Thus, during the year 1779 
and the greater part of 1780, the people divided their 
time between the fort and their farms, without any mo- 
lestation from the savages. Occasionally an alarm of In- 
dian depredations sent the entire neighborhood to the fort 
in great haste; but just so soon as the alarm had sub- 
sided they all went to their farms again. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 303 

Some few of the neighbors, for some reason or other, 
would not fort at Lowry's; whether because they appre- 
hended no danger, or because they felt quite as secure at 
home, we have no means of knowing. Among these was 
Matthew Dean, Esq., one of the most influential men in 
Canoe Valley, who lived but half a mile from the fort. 
His reason for not forting there, however, arose from an 
old personal animosity existing between himself and 
Lowry, and not from any fancied security at his own 
house, for he had several times, during the alarms of 1779, 
made preparations to remove his family to Huntingdon. 

Ill the fall of 1780, on a Sunday evening. Captain 
Simonton and his wife, and his son John, a lad eight years 
of age, j)fiid a visit to Dean's house. They spent the 
evening in conversation on the ordinary topics of the day, 
in the course of which Captain Simonton told Dean that 
he had heard of Indians having been seen in Sinking 
Valley, and that if any thing more of them was heard it 
would be advisable for them to fort. Dean gave it as his 
opinion that the rumor was false, and that there was no 
cause for alarm, much less forting. 

The family of Mr. Dean consisted of himself, his wife, 
and eight children, with the prospect of another being 
added to the family in a day or two. The last words 
Mrs. Dean spoke to Mrs. Simonton were to have her shoes 
ready, as she might send for her before morning. When 
the Simontons were ready to start, the lad John was re- 
luctant to go; and at the request of Mrs. Dean he was 
allowed to stay with their children until morning, at 
which time Mrs. Simonton promised to visit her neighbor. 

In the morning, as soon as breakfast was over. Dean, 



804 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

with his two boys and two oldest girls, went to a corn- 
field for the purpose of breaking it up preparatory to sow- 
ing rye in it. The boys managed the plough, while the 
girls made what was called "steps," or holes between the 
corn-hills, where the plough could not be brought to bear. 
Mr. Dean had taken his rifle with him, and, after directing 
the work for a while, he saw large numbers of wild pigeons 
flying in the woods adjoining the field, and he went to 
shoot some of them. He had been in the woods but a 
short time when he happened to look in the direction of 
his house, and saw smoke issuing from it, when he imme- 
diately went to his children and informed them of it. 
By that time the volume of smoke had so increased 
that they were satisfied the house was on fire, and they 
all started for home at their utmost speed. 

In the mean time Mrs. Simonton, according to promise, 
came over to Dean's house. She, too, saw the smoke 
some distance off", and by the time she reached the gate, 
which was simultaneously with the arrival of the family 
from the corn-field, the house was in a sheet of flame. Up 
to this time no one had supposed that the fire was the 
work of Indians. Mrs. Simonton saw a little girl, about 
eight years of age, lying upon the steps, scalped; but she 
did not notice its being scalped, — merely supposing that 
the child had a red handkerchief tied around its head, 
and had fallen asleep where it lay. But when she went 
into the gate to get the child out, and the blood gushed 
up between the boards on which she trod, the fearful 
reality burst upon her mind ; then she thought about her 
own little son, and for a while was almost frantic. 

News of the disaster was conveyed to the fort, and in a 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 305 

few hours the entire neighborhood was alarmed. A 
strong force, headed by the Beattys, started in pursuit, 
and got upon the track of the savages, but could not find 
them. They even waylaid the gap through which the 
war-path ran ; but all to no purpose, for they got clear of 
the settlements by some other route. 

Captain Simonton, at the time of the outrage, was at 
Minor's Mill, getting a grist ground. On his return, he 
heard the news at Water Street, when he threw the bag 
of flour from the horse, and rode as fast as the animal 
could carry him to the scene of the disaster, where he 
arrived in a state of mind bordering closely upon mad- 
ness — for he passionately loved his little boy — just as the 
neighbors were taking the roasted and charred remains 
of Mrs. Dean and her three children out of the ashes. 
One of the neighbors so engaged was a daughter of Mr. 
Beatty, now Mrs. Adams, still living in Gaysport, at a 
very advanced age, who gave us a graphic account of the 
occurrence. 

The remains taken out were joined together, and the 
skeletons of Mrs. Dean and her three children could be 
recognised; but no bones were found to conform to the 
size of Simonton's son. The Dean girls then recollected 
that, when last seen, he was playing near the front door 
with the little girl. It was then suggested that he might 
be killed, and that his body was perhaps lying somewhere 
near the house; but a most thorough search revealed 
nothing of the kind, and it was only too evident that the 
Indians had carried the child into captivity. 

The murder of the Deans was the cause of universal 
regret, for they were known and respected by every per- 

20 



306 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

son in the upper end of the Jnniata Valley, and it did not 
fail to spread consternation into every settlement, even 
where people thought themselves beyond the reach of the 
merciless and bloodthirsty savages. 

The reason why Simonton's child was carried into cap- 
tivity, instead of being murdered and scalped, was be- 
lieved to be because the Indians knew the child and 
expected that Simonton would follow them and pay libe- 
rally for his ransom. 

The remains of the Deans were buried, and the family 
bore up as well as they could under the sad infliction ; 
but it was some years before Matthew Dean fairly re- 
covered from the blow. 

The descendants of the Dean family are numerous — a 
majority of them living in the neighborhood of Williams- 
burg, Blair county. One of the young girls in the corn- 
field at the time of the massacre married a Mr. Caldwell, 
and was the mother of David Caldwell, at present one 
of the associate judges of Blair county. 

Captain Simonton never became reconciled to the loss 
of his son. He made all the inquiries he could; wrote 
to government, and even went from his home as far as to 
Chillicothe, Ohio, to attend a treaty; but all to no pur- 
pose: he could obtain no tidings of him. While there, 
he caused proclamation to be made to the Indians, offer- 
ing a reward of £10 for any information as to his where- 
abouts, or £100 for his recovery. This was a munificent 
sum for the ransom of a mere boy, considering the finan- 
cial condition of the country ; and the Indians promised to 
find him, if possible. 

A year after his return home, the final treaty for the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. d07 

delivery of prisoners was held in the Miami Valley. 
Again Captain Simon ton undertook the journey — then 
a more formidable undertaking than traversing half the 
Union would be now. 

But he was again doomed to bitter disappointment. The 
children were brought forward, but none bore the slightest 
resemblance to his lost boy. So the captain returned to 
his home, bereft of all hope. The last feeble prop was 
gone, and Simonton was as near being a broken-hearted 
man as any one could well be without giving way 
entirely to despair. 

When the late war with Great Britain broke out, Hun- 
tingdon county, notwithstanding it had more than its 
proportion of tories in the time of the Revolution, fur- 
nished three companies to go to the Canadian frontier. 
In Captain Moses Canan's company were two, probably 
three, of Captain Simonton's sons. They knew they had 
a brother abducted by the Indians, but it never occurred 
to either of them that they should ever see him. 

The companies of Captains Allison, Canan, and Vande- 
vender, encamped in Cattaraugus, New York, — a country 
then occupied by the Seneca Indians. 

These Indians were neutral at that time, although 
they favored the American cause and readily furnished 
supplies to the soldiers. Among them was a white man, 
who appeared to hold a very prominent position. He 
owned lands, cattle, horses, liv^ed in a well-constructed 
house, and was married to a squaw, by whom he had 
several children. This was the long-lost John Simonton. 
After Captain Canan's company had left, two men belong- 
ing to Vandevender's company, originally from Water 



308 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Street, commenced talking about this white man among 
the Indians ; and both of them agreed that he bore a most 
striking resemblance to the Simonton boys. 

Next day, happening to meet him in front of his own 
house, one of them accosted him with the somewhat 
abrupt question of " What is your name ?" 

He answered, in broken English, "John Sims." 

"Are you from the Juniata?" continued the man, 

" I think I am," was Simonton's reply. 

" Do you remember any thing of the country ?" 

"1 remember my father, who used to have two big 
fires, and large barrels, in which he stirred with a long 
pole." 

This answer satisfied them. Old Captain Simonton had 
a small distillery, and the man remembered the process of 
distilling very correctly. 

" Wouldn't you like to go to your old house and see your 
relatives?" inquired one of the men. 

He answered that he should like very much to do so. 
Ijut that he was so much of an Indian that he doubted 
whether his presence would afford much satisfaction to 
his friends. 

On being told that some of his brothers were in one of 
the companies, he was so much affected that he shed tears, 
and expressed great anxiety to see them. He evidently 
felt himself degraded, and saw between himself and his 
brothers an insurmountable barrier, built up by upward 
of thirty years of life among the savages ; and yet he 
longed to see them. 

While talking to the men, his wife took him away, and 
he was not seen again by them while they remained there. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 309 

His wife had a powerful influence over him, and she used 
it to the best advantage ; for she really began to suspect 
that the men had traced his origin. 

Poor old Captain Simonton ! — he never lived to learn 
the fate of the boy he so much doated upon. 

One of the sons of Captain Simonton — a very old 
man — still lives several miles west of Hollidaysburg. 



310 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XXX. 

HOLLIDAYSBURG — THE HOLLIDAY FAMILY — DEATH OF LIEUTENANT 
HOLLIDAY AT THE BATTLE OF BRANDYWINE — MASSACRE OP A 
PORTION OF WILLIAM HOLLIDAY' S FAMILY — JOHN HOLLIDAY, ETC. 

William and Adam HoUiday, cousins, emigrated from 
the North of Ireland about 1750, and settled in the 
neighborhood of the Manor, in Lancaster county. The 
feuds which existed between the Irish and German 
emigrants, as well as the unceasing efforts of the proprie- 
tary agents to keep emigrants from settling upon their 
lands, induced the Hollidays to seek a location farther 
west. Conococheague suggested itself to them as a 
suitable place, because it was so far removed from Phila- 
delphia that the proprietors could not w^ell dispossess 
them; and, the line never having been established, it 
was altogether uncertain whether the settlement was 
in Pennsylvania or Maryland. Besides, it possessed the 
advantage of being tolerably well po^^ulated. Accordingly, 
they settled on the banks of the Conococheague, and com- 
menced clearing land, which they purchased and paid for 
soon after the survey. During both the French and 
Indian wars of 1755-56 and the war of 1762-63 the 
Hollidays were in active service. At the destruction 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 311 

of Kittaning, William Holliday was a lieutenant in 
Colonel Armstrong's company, and fought with great 
bravery in that conflict with the savages. The Hollidays 
were emphatically frontier-men; and on the restoration 
of peace in 1768, probably under the impression that the 
Conococheague Valley was becoming too thickly populated, 
they disposed of their land, placed their families and 
effects upon pack-horses, and again turned their faces 
toward the west. They passed through Aughwick, but 
found no unappropriated lands there worthy of their 
attention. From thence they proceeded to the Standing 
Stone, but nothing offered there ; nor even at Frankstown 
could they find any inducement to stop ; so they con- 
cluded to cross the mountain by the Kittaning Path and 
settle on the Alleghany at or near Kittaning. William 
knew the road, and had noticed fine lands in that 
direction. 

However, when they reached the place where Holli- 
daysburg now stands, and were just on the j)oint of 
descending the hill toward the river, Adam halted, and 
declared his intention to pitch his tent and travel no 
farther. He argued with his cousin that the Indian 
titles Avest of the mountains were not extinguished; 
and if they bought from the Indians, they would be 
forced, on the extinguishment of their titles, to purchase 
a second time, or lose their lands and live in constant 
dread of the savages. Although William had a covetous 
eye on the fine lands of the Alleghany, the wise counsel 
of Adam prevailed, and they dismounted and prepared to 
build a temporary shelter. When Adam drove the first 
stake into the ground he casually remarked to William, 



312 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

" Whoever is alive a hundred years after this will see a 
tolerable-sized town here, and this will be near about the 
middle of it." This prediction has been verified to the 
letter long before the expiration of the allotted time. 

In a day or two after a shelter had been erected for the 
families, William crossed the river to where Gaysport 
now stands, for the purpose of locating. The land, how- 
ever, was too swampy, and he returned. Next day he 
crossed again, and found a ravine, south of where he 
had been prospecting, which appeared to possess the de- 
sired qualifications; and there he staked out a farm, — the 
one now owned by Mr. J. R. Crawford. Through this 
farm the old Frankstown and Johnstown Road ran for 
many years, — the third road constructed in Pennsyl- 
vania crossing the Alleghany Mountains. 

These lands belonged to the new purchase, and were 
in the market at a very low price, in order to encourage 
settlers on the frontier. Accordingly, Adam Holliday 
took out a warrant for 1000 acres, comprising all the 
land upon which Hollidaysburg now stands. The lower 
or southern part was too marshy to work ; so Mr. Holli- 
day erected his cabin near where the American House 
now stands, and made a clearing on the high ground 
stretching toward the east. 

In the mean time, William Holliday purchased of Mr. 
Peters 1000 acres of land, which embraced the present 
Crawford and Jackson farms and a greater part of Gays- 
port. Some years after, finding that he had more land 
than he could conveniently cultivate, he disposed of 
nearly one-half of his original purchase to his son-in- 
law, James Somerville. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 313 

Adam Holliday, too, having a large lot of land, dis- 
posed of a portion of it to Lazarus Lowry. Thus mat- 
ters progressed smoothly for a time, until, unfortunately, 
a Scotchman, named Henry Gordon, in search of lands, 
happened to see and admire his farm. Gordon was a 
keen, shrewd fellow, and in looking over the records of 
the land-office he discovered a flaw or informality in 
Adam's grant. He immediately took advantage of his 
discovery, and took out a patent for the land. Litigation 
followed, as a matter of course. Gordon possessed con- 
siderable legal acumen, and had withal money and a 
determined spirit. The case was tried in the courts 
below and the courts above, — decided sometimes in favor 
of one part}^ and sometimes in favor of the other, but 
eventually resulted in Gordon wresting from Adam 
Holliday and Lazarus Lowry all their land. This un- 
fortunate circumstance deeply afflicted Mr. Holliday, for 
he had undoubtedly been grossly wronged by the adroit- 
ness and cunning of Gordon ; but relief came to him 
when he least expected it. When the war broke out, 
Gordon was among the very first to sail for Europe ; and 
soon after the Council proclaimed him an attainted traitor, 
and his property was confiscated and brought under the 
hammer. The circumstances under which he had wrested 
the property from Holliday were known, so that no per- 
son would bid, which enabled him to regain his land at a 
mere nominal price. He then went on and improved, 
and built a house on the bank of the river, near 
where the bridge connects the boroughs of Hollidays- 
burg and Gaysport. The very locust-trees that he planted 



314 HISTORY OF ■THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

seventy-eight years ago, in front of his door, are still 
standing. 

During the alarms and troubles which followed in the 
course of the war, Adam Holliday took a conspicuous part 
in defending the frontier. He aided, first, in erecting 
Fetter's Fort, and afterward expended his means in turn- 
ing Titus's stable into a fort. This fort was located on 
the flat, nearly opposite the second lock below Hollidays- 
burg, and the two served as a place of refuge for all the 
settlers of what was then merely called the Upper End 
of Frankstown District. He also, with his own money, 
purchased provisions, and through his exertions arms 
and ammunition were brought from the eastern counties. 
His courage and energy inspired the settlers to make a 
stand at a time when they were on the very point of flying 
to Cumberland county. In December, 1777, Mr. Holliday 
visited Philadelphia for the purpose of securing a part 
of the funds appropriated to the defence of the frontier. 
The following letter to President Wharton was given to 
him by Colonel John Piper, of Bedford county : — 

Bedford County, December 19, 1777. 

Sir : — Permit me, sir, to recommend to you, for counsel and 
direction, the bearer, Mr. Holliday, an inhabitant of FrankstoAvn, 
one of the frontier settlements of our county, who has, at his own 
risk, been extremely active in assembling the people of that settle- 
ment together and in purchasing provisions to serve the militia 
who came to their assistance. As there was no person appointed 
either to purchase provisions or to serve them out, necessity obliged 
the bearer, with the assistance of some neighbors, to purchase a 
considerable quantity of provisions for that purpose, by which the 
inhabitants have been enabled to make a stand. His request is 
that he may be supplied with cash not only to discharge the debts 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 315 

already contracted, but likewise to enable him to lay up a store for 

future demand. I beg leave, sir, to refer to the bearer for further 

information, in hopes you will provide for their further su])port. 

Their situation requires immediate assistance. 

I am, sir, with all due respect, your Excellency's most obedient 

humble servant, 

John Piper. 

Mr. Holliday's mission was successful ; and he returned 
with means to recruit the fort with provisions and am- 
munition, and continued to be an active and energetic 
frontier-man during all the Indian ^roubles which fol- 
lowed. 

Notwithstanding the distracted state of society during 
the Revolution, William Holliday devoted much time and 
attention to his farm. His family, consisting of his wife, 
his sons John, William, Patrick, Adam, and a lunatic whose 
name is not recollected, and his daughter Janet, were 
forted at Holliday's Fort; and it was only when abso- 
lute necessity demanded it that they ventured to the 
farm to attend to the crops, after the savage marauders so 
boldly entered the settlements. 

James, who we believe was next to the eldest of 
William Holliday's children, joined the Continental army 
soon after the war broke out. He is represented as 
having been a noble-looking fellow, filled with enthu- 
siasm, who sought for, and obtained without much diffi- 
culty, a lieutenant's commission. He was engaged in 
several battles, and conducted himself in such a manner 
as to merit the approbation of his senior officers ; but he 
fell gloriously at Brandywine, while the battle was 
raging, pierced through the heart by a musket-ball. He 
was shot by a Hessian, who was under cover, and who 



316 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

had, from the same j)lace, already dispatched a number 
of persons. But this was his last shot; for a young Vir- 
ginian, who stood by the side of Holliday when he fell, 
rushed upon the Hessian, braving all danger, and hewed 
him to pieces with his sword before any defence could be 
made. 

The death of young Holliday was deeply lamented by 
his companions-in-arms, for he was brave and generous, 
and had not a single enemy in the line. His friends, 
after the battle, buried him near the spot where he 
fell; and it is doubtful whether even now a hillock of 
greensward is raised to his memory. 

About the beginning of the year 1779, the Indians 
along the frontier, emboldened by numerous successful 
depredations, came into Bedford county — within the 
boundaries of which Holliday's Fort then was — in such 
formidable bands that many of the inhabitants fled to 
the eastern counties. The Hollidays, however, and some 
few others, tarried, in the hope that the Executive Coun- 
cil would render them aid. The following petition, signed 
by William Holliday and others, will give the reader some 
idea of the distress suifered by the pioneers; it was drawn 
up on the 29th of May, 1779 :— 

To the Honorable President and Council : — 

The Indians being now in the county, the frontier inhabitants 
being generally fled, leaves the few that remains in such a dis- 
tressed condition that pen can hardly describe, nor your honors 
can only have a faint idea of; nor can it be conceived properly by 
any but such as are the subjects thereof; but, while we suflfer in the 
part of the county that is most frontier, the inhabitants of the inte- 
rior part of this county live at ease and safety. 

And we humbly conceive that by some immediate instruction 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 317 

from Council, to call them that are less exposed to our relief, we 
shall be able, under God, to repulse our enemies, and put it in the 
power of the distressed inhabitants to reap the fruits of their 
industry. Therefore, we humbly pray you would grant us such 
relief in the premises as you in your wisdom see meet. And your 
petitioners shall pray, etc. 

N.B. — There is a quantity of lead at the mines (Sinking Valley) 
in this county Council may procure for the Use of said county, 
which will save carriage, and supply our wants with that article, 
which we cannot exist without at this place ; and our flints are alto- 
gether expended. Therefore, we beg Council would furnish us 
with those necessaries as they in their wisdom see cause. 

P.S. — Please to supply us with powder to answer lead. 

(Signed) William Holliday, P. M. 

Thomas Coulter, Sheriff. 
Richard J. Delapt, Oaptain. 
Sam. Davidson. 

The prayer of these petitioners was not speedily 
answered, and Holliday's Fort was evacuated soon after. 
The Council undoubtedly did all in its power to give the 
frontiers support; but the tardy movements of the militia 
gave the savages confidence, and drove the few settlers 
that remained almost to despair. Eventually relief 
came, but not sufficient to prevent Indian depredations. 
At length, when these depredations and the delays of the 
Council in furnishing sufficient force to repel these savage 
invasions had brought matters to such a crisis that forbear- 
ance ceased to be a virtue, the people of the neighbor- 
hood moved their families to Fort Roberdeau, in Sinking 
Valley, and Fetter's Fort, and formed themselves into 
scouting parties, and by these means protected the fron- 
tier and enabled the settlers to gather in their crops in 



318 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

1780; still, notwithstanding their vigilance, small bands 
of scalp-hunters occasionally invaded the county, and, 
when no scaljDS were to be found, compromised by steal- 
ing horses, or by laying waste whatever fell in their 
way. 

In 1781, when Continental money was so terribly depre- 
ciated that it took, in the language of one of the old set- 
tlers, "seventeen dollars of it to buy a quart of whiskey," 
government was in too straitened a condition to furnish 
this frontier guard with ammunition and provisions, so that 
the force was considerably reduced. Small scouting pur- 
ties w^ere still kept up, however, to watch the savages, 
who again made their appearance in the neighborhood in 
the summer, retarding the harvest operations. 

About the middle of July, the scouts reported every 
thing quiet and no traces of Indians in the county. Ac- 
cordingly, Mr. Holliday proceeded to his farm, and, with 
the aid of his sons, succeeded in getting off and housing 
his grain. Early in August, Mr. Holliday, accompanied 
by his sons Patrick and Adam and his daughter Janet, 
then about fourteen years of age, left Fort Roberdeau for 
the purpose of taking off a second crop of hay. On their 
arrival at the farm they went leisurely to Avork, and 
mowed the grass. The weather being extremely fine, in 
;a few days they began to haul it in on a rudely-con- 
structed sled, for in those primitive days few wagons were 
in use along the frontiers. They had taken in one load, 
returned, and filled the sled again, when an acquaintance 
named McDonald, a Scotchman, came along on horseback. 
He stopped, and they commenced a conversation on the 
war. William Holliday was seated upon one of the horses 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 319 

that were hitched to the sled, his two sons were on one 
side of him, and his daughter on the opposite side. All 
of the men, as was customary then, were armed with 
rifles. While this conversation was going on, and with- 
out the slightest previous intimation, a volley was sud- 
denly fired from a thicket some sixty or seventy yards off, 
by which Patrick and Adam were instantly killed and 
the horse shot from under Mr. Holliday. The attack was 
so sudden and unexpected that a flash of lightning and 
a peal of thunder from a cloudless sky could not have 
astonished him more. The echoes of the Indian rifles had 
scarcely died away before the Indians themselves, to 
the number of eight or ten, with a loud '^' whoop T 
jumped from their place of concealment, some brandish- 
ing their knives and hatchets and others reloading their 
rifles. 

Aj)palled at the shocking traged}^, and undecided for a 
moment what course to pursue, Holliday was surprised to 
see McDonald leap from his horse, throw away his rifle, 
run toward the Indians, and, with outstretched arms, cry 
" Brother ! Brother !" which it appears was a cry for quarter 
which the savages respected. Holliday, however, knew 
too much of the savage character to trust to their mercy — 
more especially as rebel scalps commanded nearly as good 
a price in British gold in Canada as prisoners; so on the 
impulse of the moment he sprang upon McDonald's horse 
and made an efibrt to get his daughter up behind him. 
But he was too late. The Indians were upon him, and 
he turned into the path which led down the ravine. The 
yells of the savages frightened the horse, and he galloped 
down the path ; but even the clattering of his hoofs did 



320 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

not drown the dying shrieks of his daughter, who was 
most barbarously butchered with a hatchet. 

In a state of mind bordering on distraction, Holliday 
wandered about until nearly dark, when he got ujDon the 
Brush Mountain trail, on his way to Sinking Valley. His 
mind, however, was so deeply affected that he seemed to 
care little whither he went; and, the night being exceed- 
ingly dark, the horse lost the trail and wandered about 
the mountain for hours. Just at daybreak Mr. Holliday 
reached the fort, haggard and careworn, without hat or 
shoes, his clothes in tatters and his body lacerated and 
bleeding. He did not recognise either the fort or the 
sentinel on duty. He w as taken in, and the fort alarmed, 
but it was some time before he could make any thing like 
an intelligible statement of wdiat had occurred the day 
previous. Without waiting for the particulars in detail, 
a command of fifteen men was despatched to Holliday's 
farm. The}^ found the bodies of Patrick and Adam pre- 
cisely where they fell, and that of Janet but a short dis- 
tance from the sled, and all scalped. As soon as the 
necessary arrangements could be made, the bodies of the 
slain were interred on the farm; and a rude tombstone 
still marks the spot where the victims of savage crueltj^ 
repose. 

This was a sad blow to Mr. Holliday; and it was 
long before he recovered from it effectually. But the 
times steeled men to bear misfortunes that would noM' 
crush and annihilate the bravest. 

The Scotchman McDonald, whom we have mentioned 
as being present at the Holliday massacre, accompanied 
the savages, as he afterward stated, to the Miami Valley, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 321 

where he adopted their manners and customs, and remained 
with them until the restoration of peace enabled him to 
escape. He returned to the Valley of the Juniata; but he 
soon found that Holliday had prejudiced the public mind 
against him by declaring the part he took at the time of 
the massacre to have been cowardly in the extreme, not- 
withstanding that the cowardice of McDonald actually 
saved Holliday's life, by affording him means to escape. 
The people generally shunned McDonald, and he led 
rather an unenviable life; yet we might suppose, taking 
all the circumstances into consideration, that, in illus- 
trating the axiom that " self-preservation is the first law 
of nature," he did nothing more than any man, with even 
less prudence than a canny Scotchman, would have done. 
But any thing having the least squinting toward cowardice 
was deemed a deadly sin by the pioneers, and McDonald 
soon found it necessary to seek a home somewhere else. 

After the declaration of peace, or, rather, after the rati- 
fication of the treaty, Gordon came back to Pennsylvania 
and claimed his land under its stipulation. He had no 
difficulty in proving that he had never taken up arms 
against the colonies, and Congress agreed to purchase back 
his lands. 

The Commissioners to adjust claims, after examining the 
lands, reported them worth sixteen dollars an acre; and 
this amount was paid to Adam Holliday, who suddenly 
found himself the greatest monied man in this county — 
having in his possession sixteen or seventeen thousand 
dollars. 

Adam Holliday lived to a good old age, and died at his 

residence on the bank of the river, in 1801. He left two 

21 



322 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

heirs — his son John, and a daughter married to William 
Reynolds. 

After the estate was settled up, it was found that John 
HoUiday was the richest man in this county. He married 
the daughter of Lazarus Lowry, of Frankstown, in 1803, 
and in 1807 he left for Johnstown, where he jDurchased 
the farm, and all the land upon which Johnstown now 
stands, from a Dr. Anderson, of Bedford. Fearing the 
place would never be one of any importance, John HoUi- 
day, in a few years, sold out to Peter Livergood for eight 
dollars an acre, returned to Hollidaysburg, and entered 
into mercantile pursuits. 

William Holliday, too, died at a good old age, and lies 
buried on his farm by the side of his children, who were 
massacred by the Indians. 

In the ordinary transmutation of worldly affairs, the 
lands of both the old pioneers passed out of the hands of 
their descendants ; yet a beautiful town stands as a lasting 
monument to the name, and the descendants have multi- 
plied until the name of Holliday is known not only in 
Pennsylvania, but over the whole Union. 

[Note. — There are several contradictory accounts in existence touching 
the massacre of the Holliday children. Our account of it is evidently 
the true version, for it was given to us by Mr. Maguire, who received it 
from Mr. Holliday shortly after the occurrence of the tragedy. 

It may be as well here to state that the original Hollidays were Irish- 
men and Presbyterians. It is necessary to state this, because we have 
heard arguments about their religious faith. Some avow that they were 
Catholics, and as an evidence refer to the fact that William called one of 
his offspring " Patrick." Without being able to account for the name of 
a saint so prominent in the calendar as Patrick being found in a Presby- 
terian family, we can only give the words of Mr. Maguire, who said : — 

" I was a Catholic, and old Billy and Adam Holliday were Presby- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 323 

terians; but in those days we found matters of more importance to attend 
to than quarrelling about religion. We all worshipped the same God, 
and some of the forms and ceremonies attending church were very much 
alike, especially in 1778, when the men of all denominations, in place of 
hymn-books, prayer-books, and Bibles, carried to church with them loaded 
rifles!" 

It may be as well to state here also that the McDonald mentioned had 
two brothers — one a daring frontier-man, the other in the army, — so that 
the reader will please not confound them,] 



)24 HISTOEY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

OLD INDIAN TOWN OF FRANKSTOWN — INDIAN BURIAL-PLACES — MASSA- 
CRE OF THE BEDFORD SCOUT, ETC. 

Frankstown is probably the oldest j)lace on the 
Juniata River — traders having mentioned it as early as 
1750. The Indian town was located at the mouth of a 
small run, near where McCune's Mill now stands, and at 
one time contained a considerable number of inhabitants. 
The Indian name of the place was AssunejjacJda, which 
signifies a meeting of many waters, or the place where the 
waters join. This would seem to be an appropriate name, 
since, within a short distance of the place, the river is 
formed by what was then known as the Frankstown 
Branch, the Beaver Dam Branch, the Brush Run, and 
the small run near McCune's Mill. 

The name of Frankstown was given it by the traders. 
Harris, in his report of the distances between the Susque- 
hanna and the Alleghany, called it " Frank (Stephen's) 
Town." The general impression is that the town was 
named by the traders in honor of an old chief named 
Frank. This, however, is an error. It was named after 
an old German Indian trader named Stephen Franks, who 
lived cotemporaneously with old Hart, and whose post 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 325 

was at this old Indian town. The truth of this becomes 
apparent when we remember that the Indians could not 
pronounce the r in their language; hence no chief was 
likely to bear the name of Frank at that early day. Old 
Franks, being a great friend of the Indians, lived and 
died among them, and it was after his death that one of 
the chiefs took his name; hence arose the erroneous im- 
pression that the name was given to the town in honor 
of the chief. 

How long Assunepachla was an Indian settlement can- 
not be conjectured, but, unquestionably, long before the 
Indians of the valley had any intercourse with the 
whites. This is evidenced by the fact that where the 
town stood, as well as on the flat west of the town, relics 
of rudely-constructed pottery, stone arrow-heads, stone 
hatchets, &c., have repeatedly been found until within 
the last few years. 

The use of stone edge-tools was abandoned as soon as 
the savages obtained a sight of a superior article, — pro- 
bably as early as 1730. The first were brought to the 
valley by Indians, who had received them as presents 
from the proprietary fiimily. 

It is stated that the first brought to Assunepachla cost 
a special trip to Philadelphia. Three chiefs, having seen 
hatchets and knives at Standing Stone, were so fascinated 
with their utility that they resolved to have some. Ac- 
cordingly they went to work at trapping; and in the fall, 
each with an immense load of skins, started on foot for 
Philadelphia, where they arrived after a long and fatiguing 
march. They soon found what they wanted at the shop 
of an Englishman; but, being unable to talk English, 



326 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

tliey merely deposited their furs upon the counter and 
pointed to the tomahawks and knives. This indicated 
trade; and the Englishman, after a critical examination 
of their skins, which he found would yield him not less 
than £100, threw them carelessly under the counter, 
and gave them a hatchet and a knife each. With 
these the savages were about to depart, well satisfied; 
but the trader suddenly bethinking himself of the possi- 
bility of their falling in with the interpreters, and their as- 
certaining the manner in which they had been swindled, 
called them back, and very generously added three clasp- 
knives and a quantity of brass jewelry. 

With these they wended their way back, proud as 
emperors of their newly-acquired weapons. Never did 
chiefs enter a place with more pomp and importance than 
our warriors. The very dogs barked a welcome, and the 
Indians came forth from their w^igwams to greet the great 
eastern travellers. Their hatchets, knives, and trinkets 
passed from hand to hand, and savage encomiums were 
lavished unsparingly upon them ; but when their practi- 
cability was tested, the climax of savage enthusiasm was 
reached. The envied possessors were lions: they cut, 
hewed, and scored, just because they could. 

But — alas for all things mutable ! — their glory was not 
destined to last long. The traders soon appeared with 
the same kind of articles, and readily exchanged for half a 
dozen skins what the warriors had spent a season in trap- 
ping and a long journey to procure. 

On the point of Chimney Kidge, near Wert's farm, 
below Hollidaysburg, was an Indian burial-jDlace, and 
another on the small piece of table-land near the mouth 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 327 

of Brush Run. At both places skeletons of mighty chiefs 
and all-powerful warriors have been ruthlessly torn from 
their places of sepulture by the plough, and many other 
relics have been exhumed. 

The greater portion of the warriors residing at Franks- 
town went to Ohio in 1755, and took up the hatchet for 
their "brothers," the French, and against Onus, or their 
Father Penn. This act, the colonial government per- 
suaded itself to believe, was altogether mercenary on the 
part of the savages. The real cause, as we have already 
stated, was the dissatisfaction which followed the pur- 
chase of the Juniata Valley by the Penns, for a few paltry 
pounds, from the Iroquois, at Albany, in 1754. 

The town of Frankstown still continued to be a promi- 
nent Indian settlement until the army of General Forbes 
passed up the Raystown Branch, when the spies sent out 
brought such exaggerated reports of the warlike appearance 
and strength of the army that the settlement was entirely 
broken up, and the warriors, with their squaws, pappooses, 
and movable effects, crossed the Alleghany by the Kit- 
taning War-Path, and bade adieu to the valley which they 
were only too well convinced was no longer their own. 

The remains of their bark huts, their old corn-fields, 
and other indications of their presence, were in existence 
until after the beginning of the present century. 

On the flat, several white settlers erected their cabins 
at an early day, and a few near the old town, and others 
where the town of Frankstown now stands. 

During the Revolution, as we have stated, a stable 
srected by Peter Titus was turned into a fortress. In 
summer, the location of the fort can still be traced by the 



828 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

luxuriant growth of vegetation upon it. This fort was 
called Holliday's Fort. The fort at Fetter's, a mile west 
of HoUidaysburg, was known as the Frankstown garrison. 
In those days there was no such place as HoUidaysburg, 
and the Frankstown district took in a scope of country 
which now serves for five or six very large townships ; in 
short, every place was Frankstown within a radius of at 
least ten miles. 

Holliday's Fort was a mere temporary affair; while the 
Frankstown garrison was a substantial stockade, manned 
and provisioned in such a manner that a thousand savages 
could by no possible means have taken it. It never was 
assaulted except upon one occasion, and then the red- 
skins were right glad to beat a retreat before they were 
able to fire a gun. 

Near this fort occurred the massacre of the Bedford 
scout. This was unquestionably the most successful 
savage sortie made upon the whites in the valley during 
the Revolution; and, as some of the bravest and best 
men of Bedford county fell in this massacre, it did not 
fail to create an excitement compared to which all other 
excitements that ever occurred in the valley w^ere 
perfect calms. 

We shall, in the first place, proceed to give the first 
report of the occurrence, sent by George Ashman, one of 
the sub-lieutenants of the county, to Arthur Buchanan, 
at Kishicoquillas. Ashman says : — 

Sir : — By an express this moment from Frankstown, -we have 
the bad news. As a party of volunteers from Bedford was going 
to Frankstown, a party of Indians fell in with them this morning 
and killed thirty of them. Only seven made their escape to 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 329 

the garrison of Frankstown. I hope that you'll exert yourself in 
getting men to go up to the Stone ; and pray let the river-people 
know, as they may turn out, I am, in health, 

Geo. Ashman. 

Of course Colonel Ashman was not near the place, and 
his despatch to Buchanan is, as a natural consequence, made 
up from the exaggerated reports that were carried to him 
at the instance of the affrighted people residing in the 
vicinity where the massacre occurred. The following is 
the official report, transmitted by Ashman to President 
Reed : — 

Bedford County, June 12, 1781. 

Sir : — I have to inform you that on Sunday, the third of this 
instant, a party of the rangers under Captain Boyd, eight in num- 
ber, with twenty-five volunteers under Captain Moore and Lieu- 
tenant Smith, of the militia of this county, had an engagement 
with a party of Indians (said to be numerous) within three miles of 
Frankstown, where seventy -five of the Cumberland militia were sta- 
tioned, commanded by Captain James Young. Some of the party 
running into the garrison, acquainting Captain Young of what had 
happened, he issued out a party immediately, and brought in seven 
more, five of whom are wounded, and two made their escape to 
Bedford, — eight killed and scalped, — Captain Boyd, Captain Moore, 
and Captain Dunlap missing. Captain Young, expecting from the 
enemy's numbers that his garrison would be surrounded, sent ex- 
press to me immediately ; but, before I could collect as many volun- 
teers as was sufficient to march to Frankstown with, the enemy 
had returned over the Alleghany Hill. The waters being high, occa- 
sioned by heavy rains, they could not be pursued. This county, 
at this time, is in a deplorable situation. A number of families are 
flying away daily ever since the late damage was done. I can as- 
sure yoxn: Excellency that if immediate assistance is not sent to 
this county that the whole of the frontier inhabitants Avill move 
ofi" in a few days. Colonel Abraham Smith, of Cumberland, has 
just informed me that he has no orders to send us any more militia 
from Cumberland county to our assistance, which I am much sur- 



330 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

prised to hear. I shall move my family to Maryland in a feAV 
days, as I am convinced that not any one settlement is able to 
make any stand against such numbers of the enemy. If your Ex- 
cellency should please to order us any assistance, less than three 
hundred Avill be of but little relief to this county. Ammunition 
we have not any ; and the Cumberland militia will be discharged 
in two days. It is dreadful to think what the consequence of 
leaving such a number of helpless inhabitants may be to the cruel- 
ties of a savage enemy. 

Please to send me by the first opportunity three hundred pounds, 
as I cannot possibly do the business without money. You may 
depend that nothing shall be wanting in me to serve my country 
as far as my abilities. 

I have the honor to be 

Your Excellency's most obedient, humble servant, 

George Ashman, Lieut. Bedford County. 

It would appear that even a man holding an official 
station is liable to gross mistakes. In this instance, Ash- 
man, who lived remote from the scene of the disaster, was 
evidently misled by the current rumors, and such he trans- 
mitted; for there are still persons alive, who lived at the 
time of the occurrence in the immediate vicinity, who 
pronounce Ashman's statement as erroneous, and who 
give ^n entirely diiferent version of the affair. 

The seventy Cumberland county militia, under strict 
militaiy discipline, were sent first to Standing Stone, and 
afterward to Frankstown, early in the spring of 1781. 
They were under the command of Colonel Albright and 
Captain Young, and were sent with a view to waylaying 
the gaps of the xllleghany Mountains, and preventing any 
savages from coming into the valley. Instead of doing so, 
however, they proved themselves an inefficient bod}- of 
men, with dilatory officers, who chose rather the idle life 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 331 

of the fort than scouting to mtercept the savages. In 
fact, these men, in the service and pay of the Supreme 
Executive Council of the State to protect the frontier, were 
never one solitary cent's worth of advantage to the in- 
habitants. Such a force, one would suppose, would have 
inspired the people with confidence, and been fully able 
to cope with or repel the largest war-party of savages that 
ever trod the Kittaning War-Path during the Revolu- 
tionary struggle. 

Notwithstanding the presence of this large body of men, 
stationed as it were almost at the mouth of the gap 
through which the Indians entered the valley, the depre- 
dations of the savages were almost of daily occurrence. 
The inefficiency of the Cumberland militia, who either 
could not or would not check the marauders, at length 
exasperated the settlers to such an extent that they re- 
solved to form themselves into a scouting party, and range 
through the county for two months. 

This project was favored by Colonel Ashman, and he 
agreed to furnish a company of rangers to join them. 
The enrolment of volunteers by Captain Moore, of Scotch 
Valley, assisted by his lieutenant, a Mr. Smith, from the 
vicinity of Franks town, proceeded; and on the second of 
June, 1781, these men met at Holliday's Fort, then aban- 
doned for want of provisions. There they were joined 
by the rangers, under command of Captain Boyd and 
Lieutenant Harry Woods, of Bedford, but, instead of there 
being a company, as the volunteers were led to expect, 
there were but eight men and the two officers above named. 

From Holliday's Fort they marched to Fetter's, where 
they contemplated spending the Sabbath. It was their 



332 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

intention to march through the Kittaning Gap to an old 
State road, (long since abandoned,) from thence to Pitts- 
burg, and home by way of Bedford. 

While debating the matter and making the necessary 
arrangements, two spies came in and reported that they 
had come upon an Indian encampment near Hart's 
Sleeping Place, which had apparently been just aban- 
doned, as the fire was still burning; that, from the num- 
ber of bark huts, the savages must number from twenty- 
five to thirty. 

This raised quite a stir in the camp, as the scouts evi- 
dently were eager for the fray. The officers, who were 
regular woodsmen, and knew that the Indians would not 
venture into the settlement until the day following, were 
confident of meeting them near the mouth of the gap 
and giving them battle. They at once tendered to 
Colonel Albright the command of the expedition ; but he 
refused to accept it. They then importuned him to let a 
portion of his men, who were both anxious and willing, 
accompany them ; but this, too, he refused. 

Nothing daunted, however, the rangers and the volun- 
teers arose by daybreak on Sunday morning, put their 
rifles in condition, eat their breakfast, and, with five 
days' provisions in their knapsacks, started for the 
mountain. 

"We sincerely regret that the most strenuous effort on our 
part to procure a list of this scout proved futile. Here 
and there we picked up the names of a few who were in 
it; but nothing would have given us greater pleasure 
than to insert a full and correct list of these brave men. 
In addition to the officers named, we may mention the 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 666 

following privates : — James Somerville, the two Colemans, 
two Hollidays, two brothers named Jones, a man named 
Grey, one of the Beattys, Michael Wallack, and Edward 
Milligan. 

The path led close along the river, and the men 
marched in Indian file, as the path was narrow. When 
they reached the flat above where Temperance Mill 
now stands, and within thirty rods of the mouth of Sugar 
Run, the loud w^arwhoop rang upon the stillness of 
the Sabbath morning; a band of savages rose from the 
bushes on the left-hand side of the road, firing a volley 
at the same time, by which fifteen of the brave scout were 
stretched dead in the path. The remainder fled, jn con- 
sternation, in every direction, — some over the river in the 
direction of Frankstown, others toward Fetter's Fort. A 
man named Jones, one of the fleetest runners, reached the 
fort first. To screen the scout from the odium of running, 
he reported the number of the enemy so large that Al- 
bright refused to let any of his command go to the relief 
of the unfortunate men. 

As the Colemans were coming to the fort, they found 
the other Jones lying behind a log for the purpose of rest- 
ing, as he said. Coleman advised him to push on to the 
fort, which he promised to do. 

Captain Young at length started o^t with a party to 
bring in the wounded. The man Jones was found rest- 
ing behind the log, but the rest was a lasting one; he 
was killed and scalped. Another man, who had been 
wounded, was also followed a short distance and killed 
and scalped, — making, in all, seventeen persons who fell 
by this sad and unlooked-for event. In addition to the 



334 HISTORY OF the juniata valley. 

seventeen killed, five were wounded, who were found con- 
cealed in various places in the woods and removed to the 
fort. Some reached the fort in safety, others were miss- 
ing, — among the latter, Harry Woods, James Somerville, 
and Michael Wallack. 

It appears that these three men started over the river, 
and ran up what is now known as O'Friel's Ridge, hotly 
pursued by a single savage. Woods and Wallack were in 
front, and Somerville behind, when the moccasin of the 
latter became untied. He stooped down to fix it, as it 
was impossible to ascend the steep hill with the loose 
moccasin retarding his progress. While in this position, 
the Indian, with uplifted tomahawk, was rapidly approach- 
ing him, when Woods turned suddenly and aimed with 
his empty rifle* at the Indian. This caused the savage 
to jump behind a tree scarcely large enough to cover his 
body, from which he peered, and recognised Woods. 

"No hurt Woods!" yelled the Indian; "no hurt 
Woods!" 

This Indian happened to be the son of the old Indian 
Hutson, to whom George Woods of Bedford paid a small 
annual stipend in tobacco, for delivering him from bond- 
age. Hutson had frequently taken his son to Bedford, and 
it was by this means that he had become acquainted with 
Harry and readily, recognised him. Woods, although he 
recognised Hutson, had been quite as close to Indians as 
he cared about getting; so the three continued their route 
over the ridge, and by a circuitous tramp reached the fort 
in the afternoon. 

* Woods shot an Indian. His rifle was the only one discharged in 
what Colonel Ashman termed an *' engagement." 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 335 

Many years afterward, long after the war, when Woods 
lived in Pittsburg, he went down to the Alleghany River 
to see several canoe-loads of Indians that had just arrived 
from above. He had scarcely reached the landing when 
one of the chiefs jumped out, shook him warmly by the 
hand, and said — 

"Woods, you run like debble up Juniata Hill." 

It was Hutson — by this time a distinguished chief in 
his tribe. 

The fate of the unfortunate scout was soon known all 
over the country, expresses having been sent in every 
direction. 

On Monday morning Captain Young again went out 
with a small party to bury the dead, and many of them 
were interred near the spot where they fell; while others, 
after the men got tired of digging graves, were merely 
covered with bark and leaves, and left on the spot to be 
food for the w^olves, which some of the bodies unquestion- 
ably became, as Jones sought for that of his brother on 
Tuesday, and found nothing but the crushed remains of 
some bones. 

In 1852, a young man in the employ of Mr. Burns ex- 
humed one of these skeletons with the plough. It was 
found near the surface of the earth, on the bank of the 
river. The skull was perforated with a bullet-hole, and 
was in a remarkable state of preservation, although it had 
been in the ground uncoffined for a period of seventy-one 
years ! It was placed in the earth again. 

Immediately after the news of the massacre was spread, 
the people from Standing Stone and other places gathered 
at Fetter's ; and on the Tuesday following a party of nearly 



336 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

one hundred men started in pursuit of the Indians. 
Colonel Albright was solicited to accompany this force 
with his command and march until they overtook the 
enemy; but he refused. The men went as far as Hart's 
Sleeping Place, but they might just as well have remained 
at home ; for the savages, with the scalps of the scout 
dangling from their belts, were then far on their way to 
Detroit. 

When the firing took place, it was plainly heard at the 
fort; and some of the men, fully convinced that the scout 
had been attacked, asked Colonel Albright to go out with 
his command to their relief He merely answered by say- 
ing that he "knew his own business." 

For his part in the matter, he gained the ill-will of the 
settlers, and it was very fortunate that his time expired 
when it did. The settlers were not much divided in 
opinion as to whether he was a rigid disciplinarian or a 
ccyward. 

Men, arms, and ammunition, in abundance followed this 
last outrage; but it was the last formidable and warlike 
incursion into the Juniata Valley. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 337 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

shaver's creek — MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF OLD SHAVER — HEROIC CON- 
DUCT OF TWO CHILDREN — ABDUCTION OF MISS EWINQ AND MISS 
MoCORMICK — PETER CRUM, THE LAST VICTIM OF THE SAVAGES, ETC. 

The original settlement at Shaver's Creek was made in 
1770, by an old gentleman named Shaver. He was fol- 
lowed by Anderson, Maguire, the Donnelley s, and some 
few others. Old Shaver met his death in a most singular 
manner. One evening he left his home just at twilight, 
for the purpose of putting his horse into a pasture-field. 
He did not return; but his absence created no special 
alarm, as this was before the war, and before any savages 
had appeared in the valley with murderous intent. Next 
morning, however, his family not finding him, a search 
was instituted, and his body, minus the head, was found 
in a lane near the pasture-field. This was regarded as a 
most mysterious murder, and would have been charged to 
the Indians at once, had they ever been known to take a 
man's head off on any previous occasion. But as they 
always found the scalp to answer their purjDOse, and never 
encumbered themselves with the head, people shrewdly 
suspected that the Indians had nothing to do with the 

murder. The family offered a reward of £50 for the 

22 



338 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

head; and, although the country was searched in every 
direction, it never was found. 

The most active and energetic man in the Shaver's 
Creek settlement during the Revolutionary war was 
Samuel Anderson. He succeeded, mainly by his own 
exertions and the aid of a few neighbors on the creek 
and the Little Juniata, in erecting a block-house fort 
on the flat near the mouth of the creek, which was more 
or less occupied while the war continued; and it is but a 
few years since the last vestiges of this old fort were 
swept away by a freshet. 

The fort itself never was assailed; and it just happens 
to strike us forcibly at this time as a singular fact that 
the Indians, during the Revolutionary war, always kept 
clear of the forts. Whether they did not understand the 
nature of them, or feared the numbers usually congre- 
gated in them, we do not pretend to say; but they always 
kept at a respectful distance from them. Anderson's 
Fort, like the others, was frequently disturbed by alarms 
— sometimes real and sometimes false. 

An amusing instance of a false alarm at Anderson's 
Fort was given the writer. In 1779, all manner of 
rumors and reports were afloat. Everybody was forted, 
and the Indians formed the entire subject of conversation. 
One afternoon, a half-witted, cowardly fellow was sent 
up the path to bring the cows to the fort. He had been 
out about fifteen minutes when he returned, looking wild 
and haggard, and almost out of breath, declaring that the 
Indians were coming down the creek in full force. In an 
instant the whole fort was in commotion: men seized 
their rifles, dogs barked, children screamed, and every- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 339 

body swore that the audacious savages should have a 
warm reception. The entire force of the garrison 
raUied out to a hill, and, with cocked rifles, awaited 
the appearance of the enemy on the brow. Lo! he 
came; but, instead of Indians, the alarm was suddenly 
quieted by the appearance of three cows ! A mock court- 
martial was ordered to try the half-witted chap for raising 
a false alarm, and the jokers of the fort convicted him 
and passed sentence of death upon him. The joke came 
near proving fatal to the poor fellow, who for a long 
time could not be divested of the idea that he was to be 
shot. 

In 1779, one of the most remarkable cases on record 
occurred up Shaver's Creek. The particulars are vague; 
but of the actual occurrence of what we are about to 
relate there is no doubt whatever — the circumstance 
having been mentioned to us by two or three persons. 

Late in the fall of that year, two boys, aged respectively 
eight and ten years, while engaged at play near a house 
in the neighborhood of Manor Hill, were taken captive by 
two lurking savages, who came suddenly upon them, and 
immediately started in the direction of the mountain. 
After travelling some eight miles, they halted, built a fire 
in the woods, leaned their rifles against a tree, and cooked 
some dried venison, of which they all partook. After the 
meal, one of them drew from his pouch a canteen filled 
with whiskey, which they drank at short intervals until 
it was entirely drained of its contents. By that time they 
had become very garrulous and very brave. They told 
war-stories, sang war-songs, danced war-dances, and chal- 
lenged the whole settlement to mortal combat. The other 



340 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Indian then pulled out his canteen, also filled with fire- 
water, which was consumed in like manner; but, by the 
time it was drank, their mirth and boasting gave w^ay to 
the stupor of inordinate intoxication, and, wrapj)ing their 
blankets around them, they stretched themselves before 
the fire, and were soon in a deep sleep. 

The eldest boy, who had feigned sleep some time 
previous, now got up and shook the younger, who also 
got upon his feet. He then took one of the rifles, cocked 
it, and rested it on a log, with the muzzle within a few 
inches of the head of one of the savages, and then 
motioned the younger boy to hold it. He then got the 
other rifle, and in like manner placed its muzzle near the 
head of the other savage. So far, the whole proceeding 
had been carried on by pantomimic action, and not a 
word spoken; but, every thing being now in readiness, the 
boy whispered " Noiv f and both rifles went ofl^ at the same 
time. The elder boy killed his man outright; but the 
weight of the butt of the rifle in the hands of the 
younger threw the muzzle uj), and he merely tore his face 
very badly. The wounded savage attempted to rise, but, 
before he could do so, the boys commenced running for 
home; nor did they stop until they reached it, which 
was at two o'clock in the morning and just as a party had 
assembled to go in search of them. 

Their story was soon told; but so incredible did it 
appear that no person believed them. Instead of giving 
credit to their narrative of improbabilities, the parents were 
inclined to whip them and send them to bed, for getting 
lost in the w^oods and then lying about it. Next day, 
however, they persisted so strongly in their statement, and 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 341 

told such a straightforward story, that at length a party 
of some six or eight persons agreed to go to the place, 
providing the children accompanied them. To this the^^ 
readily assented; and the anxiety they manifested to go 
soon removed all doubt as to the truth of their state- 
ment. 

In due time they reached the spot, where they found a 
dead Indian, the two rifles and canteens ; but the wounded 
savage was missing. Where he had lain there was a 
pool of blood; and, as it was probable that he had not 
gone far, a proposition was made to search for him, which 
was about being acted upon, when one of the men noticed 
blood upon the trunk of the tree under which they stood, 
which caused him to look up, and among its top branches 
he saw the wounded savage. The frightful wound upon 
his face awakened the pity of some of the men, and they 
proposed getting him down ; but an old ranger, who was 
in the party, swore that he had never had a chance at an 
Indian in his life, especially a treed one; that he would 
rather lose his life than miss the opportunity of shooting 
him; and, before an effort could be made to prevent it, 
the savage received a ball through his brain, came crash- 
ing down through the limbs of the tree, and fell by the 
side of his dead companion. Their bodies were not dis- 
turbed; but their rifles were carried, home, and given to 
the boys, who kept them as trophies of the event. 

This daring and heroic act on the ]3art of children so 
young illustrates most forcibly the kind of material 
people were made of who flourished in " the days that 
tried men's souls." 

In 1782, Miss Elizabeth Ewing and Miss McCormick 



342 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

were abducted by the Indians, between Shaver's Creek 
and Stone Valley. They had been to the former place, 
and were returning home by a path, when they were sur- 
prised and taken prisoners by a small band of roving 
Indians. It was late in October, at a time when no sus- 
picion was entertained that the Indians would ever again 
enter the valley. None had been seen or heard of for 
months, and all the alarms and fears of savages had sub- 
sided; hence their absence was little thought of until 
they had been several days gone. It was then deemed 
entirely too late to send a force to recapture them. 

When captured, they had some bread with them, which 
they scattered along the path they took, in hopes that if 
their friends followed it would give them a clue to the 
route they took. The wily savages detected the stratar 
gem, and took the bread from them. They next broke 
the bushes along the path; but the Indians saw the object 
of this, too, and compelled them to desist. They then 
travelled for seven days, through sleet, rain, and snow, 
until they reached the lake, where Miss McCormick was 
given as a present to an old Indian woman who happened 
to take a fancy to her. 

Miss Ewing was taken to Montreal, where, fortunately 
for her, an exchange of prisoners took place soon after, 
and she was sent to Philadelphia, and from thence made 
her way home. From her Mr. McCormick learned the 
fate of his daughter — her communication being the first 
word of intelligence he had received concerning her. He 
soon made his arrangements to go after her. The journey 
was a long one, especially by the route he proposed to take, 
— by way of Philadelphia and New York ; nevertheless, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 343 

the love he bore his daughter prompted him. to undertake 
it cheerfully. 

After many days' travelling he arrived at the place 
where Miss Ewing and Miss McCormick parted ; but, 
alas! it was only to realize painfully the restless and 
migratory character of the Indians, who had abandoned 
the settlement and gone into the interior of Canada. 
Again he journeyed on, until he finally reached the place 
where the tribe was located, and found his daughter in an 
Indian family, treated as one of the family, and subject to 
no more menial employment than Indian women gene- 
rally. The meeting of father and daughter, which neither 
expected, must have been an affecting one — a scene 
that may strike the imagination more vividly than pen 
can depict it. 

Mr. McCormick made immediate arrangements to take 
his daughter with him ; but, to his surprise, the Indians 
objected. Alone, and, as it were, in their power, he was 
at a loss what course to pursue, when he bethought him- 
self of the power of money. That was the proper chord 
to touch; but the ransom-money asked was exorbitantly 
large. The matter was finally compromised by Mr. Mc- 
Cormick paying nearly all the money in his possession, 
retaining barely enough to defray their expenses; after 
which they went on their way rejoicing, and, after a weary 
journey, reached their home in safety. 

It may be as well to mention that Miss McCormick 
was a sister to Robert McCormick, Sr., long a resident of 
Hollidaysburg, who died a year or two ago in Altoona, 
and the aunt of William, Robert, and Alexander McCor- 
mick, now residents of Altoona. 



344 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

And now we come to the last Indian massacre in the 
Valley of the Juniata. It occurred on the left bank of the 
Little Juniata, near the farm of George Jackson, in the 
latter part of August, 1781. 

At that time there was a regular force of militia in the 
garrison at Huntingdon, another at Shaver's Creek, and 
another at Fetter's. The Indians were well aware of this, 
for they constantly kept themselves advised by spies of 
the progress of affairs in the valley. The settlers, feeling 
secure in the presence of the militia, abandoned the forts 
and went to their farms. During the summer of 1781, 
the alarms were so few that people began to consider the 
days of their trials and tribulations as passed away; but it 
appears that it was ordained that another black crime 
should be added to the long catalogue of Indian cruelties. 

One evening George Jackson, hearing a noise in a corn- 
field adjoining his house, went to the door to ascertain the 
cause. Dark as the night was, he made out the figures of 
two men, who he thought were stealing corn, or at least 
about no good; so he let loose his dogs — a hound and a 
bull-dog — upon them. The hound gave tongue, and both 
started directly into the field, where they bayed for some 
time; but the men did not quit the field. In ten minutes 
the dogs returned, and Mr. Jackson found that the skull of 
the bull-dog had been wounded with a tomahawk. This 
circumstance led him to suspect the real character of the 
intruders, and he went into his house, took down his rifle, 
and returned to the porch. The light which shone out of 
the door when Jackson opened it revealed the position of 
afiiiirs to the Indians, and they ran to the other end of the 
corn-field, closely pursued by the hound. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 345 

Peter Criim, a worthy man, well known and liiglily re- 
spected by all the settlers in the neighborhood, was a near 
neighbor of Jackson's. He had rented the Minor Tub Mill, 
and on the morning after the above occurrence he went 
to the mill a little before daylight and set it going, then 
raised a net he had placed in the stream the night before; 
after which he started leisurely on his way home to get 
his breakfast. In his left hand he carried a string of fish, 
and over his right shoulder his rifle ; for, notwithstanding 
the great security people felt, they were so much in 
the habit of constantly having a rifle for a travelling 
companion, that many of the old pioneers carried it on all 
occasions during the remainder of their lives. 

When Crum reached the bend of the river, a mile below 
his mill, at a time when an attack from Indians would 
probably have been the last thing he would have thought 
of, he heard the sharp crack of a rifle, and on looking 
around saw two Indians on the hill-side. He dropped 
his fish, and opened the pan of his rifle to look at the 
priming, when he noticed that he was shot through the 
right thumb — at least it was so conjectured. Catching a 
glimpse of one of the Indians, he attempted to fire, but 
the blood of his wound had saturated the priming. The 
Indians noticed his unavailing effort to shoot, and, probably 
thinking that he was trying to intimidate them with an 
empty gun, jumped into the road. One of them, it ap- 
peared, was armed with a rifle, the other Avith a heavy 
war-club. The latter, it is supposed, approached him from 
behind, and dealt him a blow upon the skull, which felled 
him, and the blow was evidently followed up until the 
entire back part of his head was crushed in the most 



346 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

shocking manner, after which they scaljDcd him, and dis- 
appeared. 

When found, (which was supposed to be within two 
hours after the murder,) Crum was lying with his face to 
the ground, his rifle by his side, and the Indian war-club, 
clotted with blood and brains, lying across his body, — 
a sad sight for his wife, who was among the first on the 
spot after the tragedy. 

This murder, committed in open daylight on a fre- 
quented road, in the very heart of a thickly-populated 
country, did not fail to produce the most intense excite- 
ment, and a party of rangers started at once after the 
marauders. They soon got upon their trail, and follo^^^ed 
them to the top of the mountain, getting sight of them 
several times; but they were always out of rifle-range. 
They knew they were pursued, and took such a route as 
the rangers could not follow, and so eluded them, and 
carried in triumph to the British garrison at Detroit the 
last scalp taken by the red men in the Juniata Valley, 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLET. 347 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

WARRIOR RIDGE — WARRIOR' S MARK — JOB CHILL AWAY, SHANE Y 
JOHN, AND CAPTAIN LOGAN, THE LAST RED MEN IN THE JUNIATA 
VALLEY. 

"Warrior Ridge, between Alexandria and Huntingdon, 
derives its name from an Indian path which ran along the 
summit of it. The Pulpit Rocks, not unlike the altars of 
the Druids, shaped into fantastic forms by the hand of 
nature, as well as the wild romantic scenery around them, 
at once suggest the idea of a place of meeting of the 
warriors, — a spot where the councils of the brave were 
held, with the greensward of the mountain for a carpet 
and the blue vault of heaven for a canopy. Were we not 
so well aware of the fact that the Indians preferred the 
lowlands of the valleys for places of abode, we could 
almost fancy the neighborhood of Pulpit Rocks to have 
been a glorious abiding-place; but of the occurrences and 
events that took place on the ridge we are in hopeless 
ignorance. Had some Indian historian of an early day 
transmitted to posterity, either by written or oral tra- 
dition, one-half the events of Warrior Ridge, we might 
add considerable interest to these pages; but as it is, we 



348 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

must content ourself, if not our readers, with this brief 
notice of the famous Warrior Ridge. 

Warrior's Mark was another celebrated place for the In- 
dians. It lies ujDon a flat piece of table-land, and is just 
the kind of a place where savages would be likely to meet 
to debate measures of great importance and to concoct 
schemes for their future movements. The name of the 
place originated from the fact of certain oak-trees in the 
vicinity having a crescent or half-moon cut upon them with 
hatchets, so deep that traces can still be seen of them, or, at 
least, could be some years ago. The signification of them 
was known to the Indians alone ; but it is evident that some 
meaning was attached to them, for, during the Revolution, 
every time a band of savages came into the valley one or 
more fresh warrior marks were j)ut upon the trees. The 
Indian town stood upon the highway or path leading 
from Kittaning, through Penn's Valley, to the Susque- 
hanna. It was still considerable of a village when the 
white men first settled in the neighborhood, but imme- 
diately on the breaking out of the Revolution the Indians 
destroyed it, and moved to Ohio, and at this day there is 
not a trace of its existence left. 

The first white settlers in Warrior's Mark were the 
Ricketts family. They were all wild, roving fellows, who 
loved the woods better than civilization ; and their whole 
occupation, over and above tilling a very small patch of 
land, appeared to be hunting for wild game. Their 
arrival was followed by two or three other families; 
and when the Indian troubles commenced, the house 
of Ricketts was converted into a fortress, and the men 
turned their attention to protecting the frontier. One of 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 349 

them — Captain Elijah Ricketts — became quite an active 
and prominent man. 

We have no record of any murder ever having been 
committed in the immediate vicinity of Warrior's Mark. 
Several captives were taken from thence, either in 1777 or 
1778, but were exchanged and found their way back; 
we are, however, without particulars, either as to their 
names, capture, or release. 

The three last Indians in the valley were Job Chilla- 
way, a Delaware, Shaney John, a Mingo, and Captain 
Logan, a Cayuga. They were all friendly to the whites, 
and served the cause of liberty in the capacity of 
spies. 

Job Chillaway is represented by the late E. Bell, Esq., 
in his MS., as a tall, muscular man, with his ears cut 
so as to hang pendant like a pair of ear-rings. He was 
employed as early as 1759 by the Colonial Govern- 
ment as a spy, and his name is frequently mentioned in 
the archives. Levi Trump, in Avriting to Governor 
Denny, from Fort Augusta, on April 8, 1759, when the 
French were using their most powerful exertions to 
swerve the Six Nations from their fealty to the colony, 
says : — 

Job Chillaway, a Delaware Indian, arrived here on the 5th inst., 
and brought with him a message from a grand council of the Six 
Nations held near Onondaga, to King Teedyuscung, informing 
him that deputies from said council would soon be at Wyoming. 
On what errand they did not say; but Job says he thinks it his 
duty to inform his brothers what he knows of the affair: — that 
he was present at the opening of this council; which was by 
four chiefs, of different nations, singing the Avar-song and hand- 
ing round an uncommonly large war-belt; that one of them, 



350 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

after some time, said : " What shall we do ? Here is a hatchet 
from our fathers, to strike our brothers ; and here is another 
from our brothers, to strike our fathers. I believe 'twill be best 
for us to do as we have done heretofore ; that is, cast them both 
away." 

In 1763, Chillaway still remained loyal to the co- 
lony, although nearly all of his tribe had taken up the 
hatchet against the English. Colonel James Irvine, 
under date of November 23, 1763, writes from " En- 
sign Kerns," near Fort Allen, to John Penn, as fol- 
lows : — 

Sir : — On the 16th instant Job Chillaway arrived here, being 
sent by Papunchay* to inform us that he and about twenty-five In- 
dians (women and children included) were on their way from 
Weyalusing. The day after Job's arrival he delivered a string 
of wampum, and the following message in behalf of himself, 
Papunchay, John Curtis, &c., which he desired might be trans- 
mitted to your honor, viz. : 

"Brother: — 

" We are very glad that you have taken pity on us, according 
to the promises you made us since we had any correspondence 
together. 

" Brother, — We are glad to hear you have pointed out two ways 
to us, — one to our brother, Sir William Johnson, the other to 
you. Our hearts incline toward you, the Governor of Philadel- 
phia. 

" Brother, — Take pity on us, and keep the road open, that we 
may pass without being hurt by your young men. 

" Brother, — Point out the place where you intend to settle us, 
and we shall be glad, let that be where it will." 



* Papunchay was the chief of the last of the Delaware warriors who 
remained loyal, — the great body having, by 1763, gone over to the 
French. 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 351 

Job informed us that there were fifteen Muncy warriors, who, 
for three nights before he left Papunchay, encamped close by their 
encampment. How far they intended to proceed, or what were 
their intentions, he could not find out. As it was expected that 
Papunchay was near the frontiers. Colonel Clayton marched with 
fifty men, (mostly volunteers,) on the 20th inst., with Job Chilla- 
way, in hopes of surprising the warriors. We were out three 
days without discovering either them or Papunchay. What hath 
detained the latter we know not. Job hath desired me to wait for 
them at this place a few days longer. On their arrival here, I 
purpose to conduct them to Philadelphia, unless I receive orders to 
the contrary from your honor. 

Whether Papunchay continued loyal after 1763 is 
not known; but Chillaway was a spy, in the employ 
of Asher Clayton, at Lehigh Gap, as late as May, 
1764. 

About 1768, he made his way to the Juniata Valley. 
He first located near the mouth of the Little Juniata; 
but as soon as settlements were made by the whites he 
went up Spruce Creek; but there, too, the footprints of 
the white invader were soon seen, and he removed to the 
mountain, where hunting was good. He continued for 
many years after the Revolution to bring venison down 
into the settlements to trade off for flour and bread. 
In his old age he exhibited a passion for strong drink, 
and by the white man's baneful fiver-water he fell. He 
was found dead in his cabin, by some hunters, about the 
close of the last century. 

Of Shaney John not much is known. He came to the 
valley probably about the same time Chillaway did, and 
the two were boon-companions for many years. Shaney 
John moved to the Indian town called the Bald Eagle's 



352 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

Nest, nearly opposite Milesburg, Centre county, where he 
died. 

The most prominent friendly Indian that ever resided 
in the valley, however, was Captain Logan. This, of 
course, was not his proper name, but a title bestowed upon 
him by the settlers. He is represented as having been a 
noble and honorable Indian, warm in his attachment to a 
friend, but, like all Indians, revengeful in his character. 
A kindness and an insult alike remained indelibly 
stamped upon the book and page of his memory ; and to 
make a suitable return for the former he would have laid 
down his life — shed the last drop of his heart's blood. 
He was a man of medium height and heavy frame: not- 
withstanding which he was fleet of foot and ever on the 
move. 

He came to the valley before Chillaway did, and setr 
tied with his family in the little valley east of Martin 
Bell's Furnace, which is still known as Logan's Valley. 
He had previously resided on the Susquehanna, where he 
was the captain of a brave band of warriors ; but, unfor- 
tunately, in some engagement with another tribe, he had 
an eye destroyed by an arrow from the enemy. This 
was considered a mark of disgrace, and he Avas de- 
posed ; and it was owing to that cause that he aban- 
doned his tribe and took up his residence in the Juniata 
Valley. 

One day, while hunting, he happened to pass the beau- 
tiful spring near the mouth of the Bald Eagle — now in 
the heart of Tyrone City. The favorable location for 
both hunting and fishing, as well as the charming scenery, 
fascinated Logan ; and he built himself a wigwam, im- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. oOd 

mediately above the spring, to which he removed his 
family. 

Here he lived during the Revolutionary war, not alto- 
gether inactive, for his sympathies were on the side of 
liberty. During that time he formed a strong attach- 
ment to Captain Ricketts, of Warrior's Mark, and they 
became fast friends. It was to Ricketts that Captain 
Logan first disclosed the plot of the tories under John 
"Weston; and Edward Bell gave it as his firm con- 
viction that Logan was among the Lidians who shot 
down Weston and his men on their arrival at Kit- 
taning. 

Although Logan had learned to read from the Mo- 
ravian missionaries when quite a lad, he knew very 
little of the formula of land purchases; so he failed 
to make a regular purchase of the spot on which his 
cabin stood, the consequence of which was that, after 
the war, some envious white man bought the land and 
warned the friendly savage off. Logan was too proud 
and haughty to contest the matter, or even bandy 
words with the intruder; so he left, and located at 
Chickalacamoose, where Clearfield now stands, on the 
West Branch of the Susquehanna. 

Captain Logan continued visiting the valley, and espe- 
cially when any of his friends among the pioneers died. 
On such occasions he generally discarded his red and 
blue eagle-feathers, and appeared in a plain suit of citi- 
zens' clothes. 

But at length Logan came no more. The Great 

Spirit called him to a happier hunting-ground; and all 

that is mortal of him — unless his remains have been 

23 



354 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

ruthlessly torn from the bosom of mother earth — lies 
beneath the sod, near the mouth of Chickalacamoose 
Creek. 

It is to be regretted that more of his history has not 
been preserved, for, according to all accounts of him, he 
possessed many noble traits of character. Unlike Logan 
the Mingo chief, CajDtain Logan the Cayuga chief had no 
biographer like Thomas Jefferson to embellish the pages 
of history with his eloquence. Well may we say, " The 
evil that men do lives after them, while the good is oft 
interred with their bones." 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 355 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 



CONCLUSION. 



Pushing the light canoe on the lagoons in search of 
fish and lassoing the wild horse on the pampas of the 
South, chasing the buffalo on the boundless prairies and 
hunting the antlered stag in the dense forests of the 
West, is now the Indian's occupation ; and there he may 
be found, ever shunning the haunts of civilization. 

The Delaware Indians have been exterminated, and 
their very name [Lenni Lenape) blotted from existence, 
save where it appears upon the pages of history. 

Of the Shawnees, once the powerful warlike tribe that 
was known and feared from the seaboard to the lakes, 
but a few degenerate families reside in the Far West. 

Of the Great Confederation of the Iroquois but a rem- 
nant exists to remind us of its former greatness, its 
councils, its wars, and its " talks." They reside in West- 
ern New York, in a semi-civilized but degraded state, 
and are but sorry representatives of the once proud and 
stately warriors the crack of whose sharp and unerring 
rifles made the woods ring, and whose canoes danced 
upon the waves of the blue Juniata more than a hundred 
years ago. 



'356 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 



But they are all gone, and the bones of their ancestors 
are the only relics which they have left behind them. 
The hand of the same inscrutable Providence that suffered 
them to march as mighty conquerors from the West to the 
East, crushing out the existence of a weaker people in their 
triumphant march, stayed them, blighted them in the noon- 
day of their glory, and, like the receding waves of the sea, 
drove them back in the direction whence they came, 
where they scattered, and the ties which bound them to- 
gether as tribes dissolved even as would ice beneath the 
rays of a tropical sun. 

The reader of the foregoing pages may sometimes think 
it strange that the savages committed so many depredor 
tions with impunity, killed, scalped, or carried so many 
into captivity, w^hile but comparatively few of the marau- 
ders were destroyed. The cause of this can be easily ex- 
plained. The savages always made covert attacks. As will 
be remembered, very few massacres occurred in the valley 
by open attack, — nearly all their depredations being com- 
mitted while in ambuscade or when they had a foe com- 
pletely in their power. Their incursions were always 
conducted with great caution, and no sooner did they 
strike a decisive blow than they disappeared. To guard 
against their ferocity was impossible; to follow them 
was equally futile. The settlers were too few in number 
to leave one force at home to guard against them and to 
send another in pursuit of them; for, during the Revo- 
lution, the belief was prevalent that a large force was ever 
ready to descend into the valley, and that the incursions of 
a few were only stratagems to lure the settlers to destruc- 
tion by following them to where a large number were con- 



HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 357 

cealed. It was frequently proiDosed to send a strong force 
to waylay the gaps of the mountain ; but the settlers refused 
to trust the protection of their families to the raw militia 
sent by government to defend the frontier. 

In extremely aggravating cases, men, driven to despera- 
tion, followed the savages to the verge of the Indian settle- 
ments; but they never got bej'ond the summit of the Alle- 
ghany Mountains without feeling as if they were walking 
directly into the jaws of death, for no one could other- 
wise than momentarily expect a shower of rifle-balls from 
the enemy in ambuscade. The want of men, ammunition, 
and other things, were known to and taken advantage of 
by the Indians; but when an abundance of these things 
was brought to the frontier they prudently kept out of 
the way, for their sagacity instinctively taught them what 
they might expect if they fell into the hands of the settlers. 
But it may here be remarked that the savage mode of war- 
fare, which by them was deemed fair and honorable, — such 
as scalping or maiming women and children, — was held 
in the utmost horror and detestation by people who pro- 
fessed to be Christians; and they equally detested shoot- 
ing from ambuscade as an act fit for savages alone to be 
guilty of. It was only the more reckless and desperate of 
the community that would consent to fight the savages 
after their own mode of warfare. 

It is, therefore, but a simple act of justice to the me- 
mor}^ of the pioneers to say that the savages did not go 
unpunished through any fear or lack of zeal on their part. 
Their concentrated energies were used to check the fre- 
quent invasions, and many of them spent their last 
dollar to protect the defenceless frontier; yet it is to be 



358 HISTORY OF THE JUNIATA VALLEY. 

deeply regretted that in those primitive days they lacked 
the knowledge of properly applying the power within 
their reach. 

But they, too, are all gone ! " Each forever in his nar- 
row cell is laid." Beneath their kindred dust the rude 
forefathers of the valley sleep. We have endeavored to 
give a succinct account of the trials and sufferings of many 
of them; but, doubtless, much remains untold, which the 
recording angel alone has possession of While we reflect 
upon the fact that it was through the privations and hard- 
ships iJiey endured that u'e enjoy the rich blessings of the 
beautiful and teeming valley, let us hope that they are 
enjoying a peace they knew not on earth, in that valley 
"where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary 
are at rest." 



APPENDIX. 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 

The preceding pages fulfil the original intention of pre- 
senting to the public, as far as possible, a "History of the 
Early Settlement of the Juniata Valley." Its modern history, 
fraught with rare incidents, is left to the pen of some future 
enterprising historian, who may collect the incidents neces- 
sary to construct it when but a moiety of the generation 
(still numerous) who know the valley and its multifarious 
changes for half a century past shall be dwellers in our 
midst. Still, such prospect shall not deter us from giving a 
synopsis of the history of the valley as it is, not promising, 
however, to make the record complete, or even notice in detail 
the growth and progress of the valley during the last thirty 
years. 

"When the early settlers were apprised of the fact that 
some of the more enterprising contemplated cutting a pack- 
horse road over the Alleghany Mountains, through Blair's Gap, 
they shook their heads ominously, and declared that the task 
was one which could not be accomplished. But it was accom- 
plished ; and, after its completion, it was not many years until 
the pack-horse track was transformed into a wagon-road. 
People were well satisfied with this arrangement; for no 

359 



360 APPENDIX. 

sooner was there a good road along the river than some 
daring men commenced taking produce to the East, by the 
use of arks, from the Frankstown Branch, the Raystown 
Branch, and the Little Juniata. "With these advantages, a 
majority of the inhabitants labored under the impression 
that they were keeping pace with the age; but others, en- 
dowed with a fair share of that progressive spirit which 
characterizes the American people, commenced agitating the 
project of making a turnpike between Huntingdon and 
Blairsville. The old fogies of the day gave this innovation 
the cold shoulder, spoke of the immense cost, and did not 
fail to count the expense of travelling upon such a road. 
But little were their murmurings heeded by the enterprising 
men of the valley. The fast friend of the turnpike was Mr. 
Blair, of Blair's Gap, west of Hollidaysburg. His influence 
was used in the halls of the Legislature until he injured his 
political standing ; nevertheless, he persevered until the com- 
pany was chartered, and he soon had the satisfaction of 
seeing the turnpike road completed. Once built, it was found 
to be rather a desirable institution, and its value soon re- 
moved all opposition to it. 

Anon came the startling proposition of building a canal 
along the Juniata, and a railroad over the Alleghany Moun- 
tains, to connect the waters of the Juniata and the Cone- 
maugh. To men of limited information the project seemed 
vague and ill-defined ; while knowing old fogies shook their 
heads, and declared that a canal and a turnpike both could 
not be sustained, and that, if the former could accomplish 
the wonders claimed for it, the teams that carried goods 
between Philadelphia and Pittsburg in the short space of from 
fifteen to twenty days would be compelled to suspend opera- 
tions ! But the opposition to the canal was too insignificant 
to claim notice ; and when the building of it was once com- 
menced an improvement mania raged. The stately and 



THE -VALLEY AS IT IS. 361 

learned engineer, Moncure Robinson, was brought all the 
way from England to survey tlie route for tbe Portage Eoad. 
Like a very colossus of roads, be strode about tbe mountain, 
and bis nod and beck, like that of imperial Csesar upon bis 
tbrone, was tbe law, from wbicb tbere was no appeal. By 
dint of long labor, and at a vast expense to tbe common- 
wealtli, be demonstrated clearly tbat a road could be built 
across tbe mountain, and rendered practicable by tbe use 
of ten inclined planes. Alas ! for tbe perisbable nature of 
glory! Moncure Robinson bad bardly time to reach his 
home, and boast of tbe honor and fame be achieved in tbe 
New World, before a Yankee engineer discovered tbat a rail- 
road could be built across tbe Alleghany Mountain without 
the use of a single plane ! Of course, then be was thought a 
visionary, and tbat not a quarter of a century ago ; yet now 
we have two railroads crossing tbe mountain without the use 
of a plane, and tbe circumstance appears to attract no other 
remark than that of ineffable disgust at the old fogies who 
could not make a road to cross the Apalachian chain without 
the tedious operation of being hoisted up and lowered down 
by stationary engines. 

The era of "flush times" in tbe valley must have been 
when tbe canal was building. Splendid fortunes were made, 
and vast sums of money sunk, by the wild speculations which 
followed tbe advent of the contractors and the sudden rise 
of property lying along the river. As an instance of the 
briskness of the times in the valley when tbe canal was 
building, an old settler informs us that Frankstown at tbat 
time contained fourteen stores, five taverns, and four rou- 
lette tables. At present, we believe, it contains but two or 
three stores, one tavern, and no gambling apparatus to relieve 
the reckless of their surplus change. 

The completion of the canal was the great event of the day, 
and the enthusiasm of the people could scarcely be kept within 



?«. 



362 APPENDIX. 

bounds when the ponderous boats commenced ploughing the 
ditch. This will be readily believed by any one who will read 
the papers published at the time. From a paper printed in 
Lewistown on the 5th of November, 1829, we learn that a 
packet-boat arrived at that place from Mifflin on the Thurs- 
day previous, and departed again next day, having on board a 
number of members of the Legislature, as well as citizens and 
strangers. The editor, in speaking of the departure, enthu- 
siastically says: — "The boat was drawn by two white horses, 
when she set off in fine style, with the ' star-spangled banner ' 
flying at her head, and amid the roar of cannon, the shouts 
of the populace, and the cheering music of the band which 
was on board." Eeader, this was a little over twenty-six 
years ago; and the jubilee was over a packet capable of ac- 
complishing the mighty task of carrying some forty or fifty 
passengers at the rate of about four miles an hour. 

The climax of joy, however, appears to have been reached 
by the editor of the Huntingdon Gazette, on the 15th of July, 
1831, when he became jubilant over the launch of a canal- 
boat, and gave vent to the following outburst: — "What! a 
canal-boat launched in the vicinity of Huntingdon ! Had any 
one predicted an event of this kind some years back, he, in 
all probability, would have been yclept a wizard, or set down 
as beside himself!''' 

These gushings of intensified joy, although they serve to 
amuse now, do not fail to convey a useful lesson. Let us not 
glory too much over the demon scream of the locomotive 
as it comes rattling through the valley, belching forth fire 
and smoke, or the miraculous telegraph which conveys mes- 
sages from one end of the Union to the other with the rapidity 
with which a lover's sigh would be wafted from the Indies to 
the Pole ; for who knows but that the succeeding generation, 
following in the footsteps made by the universal law of progress, 
will astonish the world with inventions not dreamed of in our 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 363 

philosophy, which will throw our electric-telegraphs and rail- 
roads forever in the shade ? 

For eighteen years, with the exception of the winter months, 
the canal packet held sway in the Juniata Valley, carrying its 
average of about thirty passengers a day from the East to the 
"West, and vice versa. When hoar old winter placed an em- 
bargo upon the canal craft, travel used to dwindle down to 
such a mere circumstance that a rickety old two-horse coach 
could easily carry all the passengers that offered. "Who among 
us that has arrived at the age of manhood does not recollect 
the packet-boat, with its motley group of passengers, its snail 
pace, its consequential captain, and its non-communicative 
steersman, who used to wake the echoes with the " to-to-to-to- 
toit" of his everlasting horn and his hoarse cry of "lock 
ready?" The canal-packet was unquestionably a great insti- 
tution in its day and generation, and we remember it with 
emotions almost akin to veneration. Right well do we re- 
member, too, how contentedly people sat beneath the scorch- 
ing rays of a broiling sun upon the packet, as it dragged its 
slow length along the sinuous windings of the canal at an 
average speed of three and a half or four miles an hour ; and 
yet the echo of the last packet-horn has scarcely died away 
when we see the self-same people standing upon a station- 
house platform, on the verge of despair because the cars 
happen to be ten minutes behind time, or hear them calling 
down maledictions dire upon the head of some offending con- 
ductor who refuses to jeopardize the lives of his passengers 
by running faster than thirty miles an hour ! 

At length, after the canal had enjoyed a sixteen years' 
triumph, people began to consider it a "slow coach;" and, 
without much debate, the business-men of Philadelphia re- 
solved upon a railroad between Harrisburg and Pittsburg. 
The project had hardly been fairly determined upon before 
the picks and shovels of the "Corkonians" and "Fardowns" 



364 APPENDIX. 

were brought into requisition ; but, strange to say, tliis giant 
undertaking struck no one as being any thing extraordinary. 
It was looked upon as a matter of course, and the most frequent 
remarks it gave rise to were complaints that the making of the 
road did not progress rapidly enough to keep pace with the pro- 
gress of the age. And, at length, when it was completed, the 
citizens of Le^\dstown did not greet the arrival of the first 
train with drums, trumpets, and the roar of cannon ; neither 
did any Huntingdon editor exclaim, in a burst of enthusiasm, 
on the arrival of the train there, "What! nine railroad cars, 
with six hundred passengers, drawn through Huntingdon by 
a locomotive ! If any person had predicted such a result some 
years ago, he would have been yclept a wizard, or set down as 
one beside himself." 

The Pennsylvania Railroad once finished, although it fiiiled to 
create the sui'prise and enthusiasm excited by the canal, did not 
fail to open up the valley and its vast resources. Independent 
of the great advantage of the road itself, let us see what fol- 
lowed in the wake of this laudable enterprise. The railroad 
created the towns of Altoona, Fostoria, Tipton, and Tyrone ; 
its presence caused the building of three plank roads, and 
the opening of extensive coal and lumber operations in the 
valley, and kindred enterprises that might never have been 
thought of. Nor is this all. A rage for travel by railroad has 
been produced by the Pennsylvania Company; and there is 
good reason to believe that it will increase until at least three 
more roads tap the main artery in the Juniata Valley, — the 
railroad from Tyrone to Clearfield, from the same place to 
Lock Haven, and from Spruce Creek to Lewisburg. These 
roads will unquestionably be built, and at no remote period. 
The Pennsylvania Road has now facilities for doing business 
equal to those of any road of the same length in the world ; and, 
when a second track is completed, it is destined, for some years 
at least, to enjoy a monopoly of the carrying trade between 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 365 

Pittsburg and Philadelplaia. Much as we regret it, for tlie 
sake of the Commonwealth which expended her millions with- 
out any thing like an adequate return, the canal is rapidly 
falling into disuse, and we see, with deep regret, that it has 
become entirely too slow for the age in which we live. With 
all the vitality forced into it that can be, we confess we can 
see no opposition in it to the road but such as is of the most 
feeble kind ; yet all will agree that this opposition, trifling as it 
is, should continue to exist until such a time as other routes shall 
be opened between these points, and healthy competition esta- 
blished. But let us not dwell too much upon our modes of transit 
through the valley, lest the historian of a hundred years hence 
will find our remarks a fitting theme for ridicule, and laugh 
at us because we speak in glowing terms of a single railroad, 
and that road with but a single track for more than half 
its distance! 

In order to give the reader a little insight into the progress 
which has been made in the valley, let us turn statistician for a 
time, with the understanding, however, that we shall not be 
held responsible for the accuracy of dates. 

Less than twenty-six years ago, George Law sat upon the 
left bank of the Juniata, two miles west of Williamsburg, 
cutting stones for building two locks at that place. Noiv the 
aforesaid Law is supposed to be worth the snug little sum of 
six millions of dollars, and not long since was an aspirant for 
the presidential chair ! 

Thirty years ago, when Frankstown was a place of some 
note, Hollidaysburg contained but a few scattered cabins. 
In fact, twenty years ago it was "to fortune and to fame 
unknown;" yet it now contains a population (including 
that of Gaysport) that will not fall much short of four 
thousand. 

Less than twenty-five years ago, Dr. P. Shoenberger, while 
returning from Baltimore with $15,000 in cash, fell in with 



366 APPENDIX. 

tlie celebrated robber Lewis on the Broad Top Mountain. 
The intention of Lewis, as he afterward acknowledged, was to 
rob him ; but the doctor, although he was unacquainted with 
his fellow-traveller, had his suspicions awakened, and, by 
shrewd manoeuvering, succeeded in giving him the slip. Had 
the $15,000 in question fallen into the hands of the robber. 
Dr. Shoenberger would have been bankrupt, and the proba- 
bility is that he would have lived and died an obscure indi- 
vidual. Instead of that, however, the money freed him from 
his embarrassments, and he died, but a few years ago, worth 
between four and five millions of dollars — more than one-half 
of which he accumulated by manufacturing iron in the Valley 
of the Juniata. 

Less than sixteen years ago, a gentleman named Zimmer- 
man was a bar-keeper at the hotel of Walter Graham, Esq., 
at Yellow Springs, in Blair county, afterward a "mud-boss" 
on the Pennsylvania Canal, and subsequently a teamster at 
Alleghany Furnace. At the present day the said Samuel Zim- 
merman owns hotels, palaces, a bank of issue, farms, stocks, and 
other property, at Niagara Falls, in Canada, which swell his 
income to |150,000 per annum. He is but thirty-eight years 
of age. Should he live the length of time allotted to man, 
and his wealth steadily increase, at the end of threescore-and- 
ten years he can look upon ordinary capitalists, who have 
only a few millions at command, as men of limited means. 

Let it not be presumed, however, that we notice these capi- 
talists from any adoration of their wealth or homage to the 
men, but merely because their history is partially identified 
with the valley, and to show in what a singular manner the 
blind goddess will sometimes lavish her favors ; for hundreds 
of men without money, but with brighter intellects and 
nobler impulses than ever were possessed by Zimmerman, 
Law, or Shoenberger, have gone down to the grave " unwept, 
unhonored, and unsung," in the Juniata Valley. Neither will 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 367 

the soughing of the west wind, as it sweeps through the 
valley, disturb their repose any more than it will that of the 
millionaires when resting from "life's fitful fever" in their, 
splendid mausoleums. 

Less than ten years ago a railroad from Huntingdon to 
Broad Top was deemed impracticable. Since then, or, we 
may say, within the last four years, a substantial railroad has 
been built, reaching from the borough of Huntingdon to 
Hopewell, in Bedford county, a distance of thirty-one miles ; 
and the cars are now engaged in bringing coal from a region 
which, but a few years ago, was unexplored. Li addition to 
the main track, there is a branch, six miles in length, extend- 
ing to Shoup's Kun. The coal-field contains eighty square 
miles of territory ; and from the openings made at Shoup's 
Run and Six Mile Run semi-bituminous coal has been taken 
the quality of which cannot be surpassed by any coal-fields in 
the world. Along the line of the road quite a number of vil- 
lages have sprung up. The first is "Worthington, some thir- 
teen miles from Huntingdon. The next is Saxton, twenty-six 
miles from Huntingdon. Coalmont is the name of a flourish- 
ing village growing up on Shoup's Run, about a mile below 
the lowest coal-veins yet opened. Barret is located about 
two miles farther up; and Broad Top City is located upon 
the^summit of the mountain, at the terminus of the Shoup's 
Run Branch, at which place a large three-story stone 
hotel has been built, and a number of lots disposed of, on 
which purchasers are bound to build during the summer of 
1856. 

Less than eight years ago the author of these pages, while 
on a gunning expedition, travelled over the ground where 
Altoona now stands. It was then almost a barren waste. A 
few fields, a solitary log farm-house and its out-buildings, and 
a school-house, alone relieved the monotony of the scene; 
yet now upon this ground stands a town with between three 



368 APPENDIX. 

and four thousand inhabitants, where the scream of the 
engine is heard at all hours of the day and night, — where the 
roar of fires, the clang of machinery, and the busy hum of 
industry, never cease from the rising to the setting of the sun, 
and where real estate commands a price that would almost 
seem fabulous to those not acquainted with the facts. But of 
this enough. 

Let us now proceed to examine the products of the valley. 
The lower end of it is a grain-growing region, the upper an 
iron-producing country; and it is owing to the mineral re- 
sources alone that the valley maintains the position it does 
and boasts of the wealth and population it now possesses. 
The Juniata iron has almost a worldwide reputation ; yet we 
venture to say that many of our own neighbors know little 
about the immense amount of capital and labor employed in 
its manufacture. The following is a list of the iron establish- 
ments in the valley: — 

BEDFORD COUNTY. 

Name. Location. Owner. 

Bloomfield Furnace Middle Woodbury John W. Duncan. 

Lemnos " Hopewell John King & Co. 

Lemnos Forge " " " 

Bedford " " " " 

Bedford Foundry and Machine- 
shop Bedford Michael Bannon. 

Keagy's Foundry Woodbury Snowden & Blake. 












■■" 








BLAIR COUNTY. 




Alleghany Fu 
Blair 


rnace 




Logan township 


.... Elias Baker. 

.... H. N. Burrouo"hs. 


Elizabeth 


and Forge 


.... Martin Bell. 


Bald Eagle 
Etna 


Snyder " 


.... Lyon, Shorb & Co. 
... Isett, Keller & Co. 


Springfield 


Woodberry " 


... D. Good & Co. 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 



369 



Name. 
Rebecca Furnace 

Sarah " 

Gap " 

Frankstown " 

Harriet '■ 

Hollidaysburg Furnace 

Chimney Rock " 

Gaysport " 

Portage Works (rolling-mill, 
&c.) 

Maria Forges (two) 

Lower Maria Forge 

Gap " 

Elizabeth " 

Tyrone Forges (two) 

Cove Forge 

Franklin Forge 

Cold Spring Forge 

Alleghany " 

Hollidaysburg Foundry and 
Machine-shop 

Gaysport Foundry and Ma- 
chine-shop 

Tyi'one Foundry 

Williamsburg Foundry 

Martinsburg " 

Penn'a Railroad " 

Duncansville " 

Axe and Pick Factory 



Location. Owaer. 

Houston township E. H. Lytle. 

Greenfield " D. McCormick. 

Juniata " E. F. Shoenberger. 

Frankstown A. & D. Moore. 

Alleghany township Blair Co. Coal & Iron Co. 

Gaysport Watson, White & Co. 

Hollidaysburg Gardener, Osterloh & Co. 

Gaysport Smith & Caldwell. 

Dmicausvillc J. Higgins & Co. 

Juniata township J. W. Duncan. 

«' " D. McCormick. 



Antes 

Snyder 

Woodberry 

a 

Antes 
Alleghany 



Musselman & Co. 
John Bell. 
Lyon, Shorb & Co. 
J. Royer. 

D. H. Royer. 
Isett & Co. 

E. H. Lytle. 



Hollidaysburg J. R. McFarlane & Co. 

Gaysport McLanahan, Watson & Co. 

Tyrone City J. W. Mattern & Co. 

Williamsburg Loncer & Hileman. 

Martinsburg Crawford & Morrow. 

Altoona Penna. Railroad Co. 

Duncansville Mr. Gibboney. 

Alleghany township J. Colclesser. 



HUNTINGDON COUNTY. 
Huntingdon Fuxuace Franklin township G. K. & J. H. Shoenberger. 



Monroe 
Greenwood 






. Jackson " 


George W. Johnston & Co. 

.... A & .T Wrio-ht 


Rough and 


Ready 


Furnace 


. Hopewell " 


Wood, Watson & Co. 


Paradise Furnace. 




. Tod 


Trexler & Co. 


MiU Creek 


" 




. Brady " 


Irvin, Green & Co. 


Edward 


" 




. Shirley 


Beltzhoover & Co. 


RockhiU 


IC 






Isett, Wigtou& Co. 

Shiffler & Son. 


Matilda 


" 


and Forge. . 


. Springfield <' 








24 





370 APPENDIX. 

Name. Location. Owner. 

Coleraine Forges (two) Franklin township Lyon, Shorb & Co. 

Stockdale Forsce " " John S. Isett. 



" " " G. K. & J. H. Shoenberger 

Elizabeth " " " Martin Gates's heirs. 

Rolling Mill and Puddling 

Forge Porter " S. Hatfield & Son. 

Juniata Rolling Mill and 

Forge West " B. Lorenz, (Lessee.) 

Barre Forge Porter " Joseph Green & Co. 

Alexandria Foundry J. Grafius. 

Water Street " Job Plympton. 

Spruce Creek " H. L. Trawly. 

Petersburg " H. Orlady. 

Huntingdon " J. M. Cunningham & Co. 

Sbirleysburg " John Lutz. 

Eagle " Tod township J. & D. Hamilton. 



MIFFLIN COUNTY. 

Lewistown Furnace Lewistown Etting, Graff & Co. 

Hope " Granville township W. W. Happer & Co. 

Matilda " Wayne " W. Righter. 

Brookland " McVeytowu Huntingdon, Robison & Co. 

" Rolling Mill " " " " 

Freedom Forge Derry township J. A. Wright & Co. 

Juniata Foundry and Machine- 
shop Lewistown Zeigler & AVillis. 

Logan Foundry " A. Marks & Co. 

McVcytown Foundry McVeytown Faxon & Co. 

Axe Factory Near Reedsville A. Mann. 

Plough Foundiy " " J. & M. Taylor. 

In addition to these, there may be some few foundries in 
Juniata and Perry counties, but no furnaces or forges in that 
portion of them which lies in the valley proper. 

It may be as well here to mention that the furnace of "Wat- 
son, "White & Co. is just completed ; the Chimney Eock Furnace 
will be completed during the summer of 1856, as well as the 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 371 

furnace of Messrs. Smith & Caldwell, in Gaysport. These 
three furnaces follow the discovery of immense fossil ore- 
veins immediately back of Hollidayshurg, which are supposed 
to extend, in irregular strata, from the river east as far as the 
basin extends. In addition to this, in the Loop, — a basin 
lying between points of the Cove Mountain, south of Franks- 
town, — mines capable of the most prolific yield have also 
been opened. The ore, smelted with coke, is said to produce 
the best iron in market, and commands a ready sale at excel- 
lent prices. From the discoveries of ore-deposits already 
made, and those that will follow future explorations, it is but 
reasonable to infer that, during the next four or five years, the 
number of furnaces will be considerably augmented ; and at 
this time there is a project on foot for building an extensive 
rolling-mill and nail-factory at Hollidayshurg. 

The foregoing list of iron establishments numbers seventy- 
three, (and we are by no means certain that we have enume- 
rated all,) and employ some six or seven thousand men, 
directly or indirectly, and the capital invested cannot possibly 
fall far short of five millions of dollars. And all this vast 
source of wealth and happiness is drawn from the bosom of 
mother earth in a valley a little over a hundred miles in 
length. We say it boldly, and challenge contradiction, that 
the iron-mines of the Juniata Valley have jaelded more clear 
profit, and entailed more blessings upon the human family, 
than ever the same extent of territory did in the richest dig- 
gings of California. 

But, great as the valley is, unquestionably half its resources 
have not yet been developed. Along the base of the moun- 
tain are vast seams of coal that have never been opened, and 
forests of the finest timber, which only await capital and enter- 
prise to show the real extent of our coal and lumber region. 
Of the extent of the ore-fields of the valley no man can form 
any conception. Time alone can tell. Yet we are not without 



372 APPENDIX. 

hope that ore will he found in such quantities, hefore the 
present generation shall have passed away, as shall make the 
valley a second lYales in its iron operations. 

From De Bow's Census Compendium of 1850 we copy 
the following, set down as an accurate statement of the 
amount of capital, hands employed, and amount produced, 
in all the counties of the valley, by manufactu^'es, in that 
year : — 

Counties. Capital. Hands employed. Amount produced. 

Bedford $212,500 427 $561,339 

Blair 1,065,730 1883 1,385,526 

Huntingdon 1,335,525 1218 1,029,860 

Mifflin 129,285 300 310,452 

Juniata 309,300 182 467,550 

Perry 836,992 609 845,360 

Total $3,389,282 4119 $4,600,087 

This is manifestly an error ; for we are satisfied that more 
capital and hands were employed in the iron business alone 
in 1850, leaving out Perry county, only a portion of which 
belongs to the valley proper. The gatherers of the statistics 
evidently did not enumerate the wood-choppers, charcoal- 
burners, teamsters, ore-diggers, and others, who labor for fur- 
naces. Yet, granting that the statistics of the manufactures 
of the valley, as given in the census report, are correct, and 
we deduct a tenth for manufactures other than iron, we are 
still correct; for since then new furnaces, forges, and foun- 
dries have been built, the capacity of old ones greatly en- 
larged, and many that were standing idle in 1850 are now in 
successful operation. In Altoona alone, since then, 600 hands 
find steady employment in working up the Juniata iron at the 
extensive machine-shops and foundries of the Pennsylvania 
Railroad Company. 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 373 

The following shows the population in 1840, and in 1850, 
together with the number of dwellings : — 

Counties. Pop. in 1840. Pop. in 1880. Dwellings. 

Bedford 29,335 23,052 3,896 

Blair, (formed out of Huntingdon and Bedford, 1846) 21,777 3,718 

Huntingdon 35,484 24,786 4,298 

Mifflin 13,092 14,980 2,591 

Juniata 11,080 13,029 2,168 

Perry 17,096 20,088 3,412 



Total 100,085 117,712 20,083 

If we add to Bedford the 7567 inhabitants taken from it to 
form Fulton county, we shall find that the population increased 
19,192 in the valley, between 1840 and 1850. This may be 
rated as an ordinary increase. To the same increase, be- 
tween 1850 and 1860, we may add the extraordinary increase 
caused by the building of the Pennsylvania and the Broad 
Top Railroads, which, we think, will increase the population 
to double what it was in 1840 by the time the next census is 
taken. 

The number of dwellings in the valley, it will be observed, 
amounted, in 1850, to 20,083. Since then, five hundred build- 
ings have been erected in Altoona, one hundred and fifty in 
Tyrone, five hundred in the towns and villages along the line 
of the Broad Top Road, a hundred along the line of the 
Pennsylvania Road, while the towns of Hollidaysburg, Hunt- 
ingdon, McVeytown, Lewistown, Mifflin, and l!^ewport, and, 
in fact, all the villages in the valley, have had more or less 
buildings erected during the past five years. A corre- 
sponding number erected during the next five years will, 
we venture to predict, bring the census return of buildings 
up to 40,000. 

Let it also be remembered that the increase of population 
between 1840 and 1850 was made when the mania for mo\'in£f 



374 APPENDIX. 

to the West was at its height; when more people from the 
Juniata located in Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana, 
than will leave us during the next twenty years, unless some 
unforeseen cause should transpire that would start a fresh tide 
of western emigration. The fact that many who have taken 
up their residences in the Far West would most willingly re- 
turn, if they could, has opened the eyes of the people, in a 
measure ; and many have become convinced that a man who 
cannot live and enjoy all the comforts of life on a fine Penn- 
sylvania farm can do little better upon the prairies of Iowa 
or the ague-shaking swamps of Indiana. As an evidence that 
money may be made at home here by almost any pursuit, 
attended with perseverance, we may incidentally mention that 
a gentleman near Frankstown, who owns a small farm, — 
probably one hundred and sixty acres, — not only kept his family 
comfortable during the last year, but netted $1400 clear profit, 
being half the amount of the original purchase. Is there a farm 
of the same size in Iowa that produced to its owner so large a 
gum over and above all expenses ? But, more than this, we can 
safely say, without fear of contradiction, that every acre of culti- 
vated land in the Juniata Valley has, during the last two years, 
netted as much as the same amount of land in the most fertile 
and productive Western State in the Union. A large propor- 
tion of the people who have located in the West, actuated by 
that ruling passion of the human family — the accumulation of 
money, (mostly for dissipated heirs to squander,) — are engaged 
in speculating in lands. Now, we venture to say that the in- 
•orease in the price of some of the lands in the Juniata Valley 
will vie with the rapid rise in the value of Western lands; and 
we are prepared to maintain our assertions with the proof. Some 
years ago a gentleman in Huntingdon county took a tract of tim- 
ber-land, lying at the base of the mountain in Blair county, for a 
debt of some four or five hundred dollars. The debt was deemed 
hopelessly bad, and the land Httle better than the debt itself. 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 375 

Right willingly would the new owner have disposed of it for 
a trifle, but no purchaser could be found. Anon the railroad 
was built, and a number of steam saw-mills were erected on 
lands adjoining the tract in question, when the owner found a 
ready purchaser at $2500 cash. A gentleman in Gaysport, in 
the summer of 1854, purchased twelve acres of ground back 
of HoUidaysburg for seven hundred dollars. This sum he 
netted by the sale of the timber taken off it preparatory to 
breaking it up for cultivation. After owning it just one year, 
he disposed of it for $3000 ! A gentleman in HoUidaysburg, 
in the fall of 1854, bought three hundred and eighty acres of 
ground, adjoining the Frankstown Ore Bank, for three hun- 
dred and eighty dollars. The undivided half of this land was 
sold on the 22d of February, 1856, for $2900, showing an in- 
crease in value of about 1400 per cent, in fifteen months; and 
yet the other half could not be purchased for $5000. By this 
the land speculator will see that it is not necessary for him to 
go to the Far "West to pursue his calling while real estate rises 
80 rapidly in value at home. 

"Within a few years past, the Juniata country has been 
made a summer resort by a portion of the denizens of Phila- 
delphia, Baltimore, and Pittsburg. From either city it is 
reached after but a few hours' travel. The romantic scenery, 
the invigorating air, and the pure water of the mountains, are 
attractions that must eventually outweigh those of fashionable 
watering-places, with their customary conventional restraints. 
The hotels erected along the line of the Pennsylvania Railroad 
are admirably adapted, and have been built with a view to ac- 
commodate city-folks who wish to ruralize during the summer 
months. Prominent among them we may mention the Pat- 
terson House, kept by General Bell; the House, kept by 
Mrs. C. C. Hemphill, at the Lewistown station ; the Keystone 
Hotel, at Spruce Creek, kept by Colonel R. F. Haslett; the 
City Hotel, Tyrone City; the large hotel at Tipton; the 



376 APPENDIX. 

Logan House, in Altoona; the two large hotels lately erected 
at Cresson, by Dr. Jackson, (capable of accommodating five 
hundred guests;) and EifBe's Mansion House at the Summit. 
In addition to these, all the larger towns contain excellent 
hotels. In short, Ave may say that the hotels of the valley, 
collectively, cannot be surpassed by country hotels any- 
where. 

The valley is not without its natural curiosities to attract 
the attention of the man of leisure. The Arch Spring and the 
Cave in Sinking Valley are probably among the greatest curi- 
osities to be found in any country. The spring gushes from 
an opening arched by nature in such force as to drive a mill, 
and then sinks into the earth again. The subterranean pas- 
sage of the water can be traced for some distance by pits or 
openings, when it again emerges, runs along the surface 
among rocky hills, until it enters a large cave, having the 
appearance of an immense tunnel. This cave has been ex- 
plored as far as it will admit — some four hundred feet, — where 
there is a large room, and where the water falls into a chasm 
or vortex, and finds a subterranean passage through Canoe 
Mountain, and emerges again at its southern base, along 
which it winds down to "Water Street and empties into the 
river. 

Another of these subterranean wonders is a run back of 
Tyrone City, where it sinks into the base of a limestone ridge, 
passes beneath a hill, and makes its appearance again at the 
edge of the town. 

The most remarkable spring, however, is one located on the 
right bank of the river, some seven miles below Hollidaysburg. 
The peculiar feature about this spring is the fact that it ebbs 
and flows with the same regularity the tides do. The admirer 
of natural curiosities may arrive at it when it is brimming 
full or running over with the purest of limestone water ; yet 
in a short time the water will commence receding, and within 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 377 

an hour or two the hole in the ground alone remains. Then 
a rumbling noise is heard up the hill-side, and soon the water 
pours down until the spring is again overflowed. 

In the town of Williamsburg, on the property of John K. 
l!feff, Esq., there is a remarkable spring. It throws out a 
volume of water capable of operating a first-class mill, together 
with other machinery, although the distance from the spring 
to the river does not exceed the eighth of a mile. 

At Spang's Mill, in Blair county, is by far the largest spring 
in the upper end of the valley. It has more the appearance 
of a small subterranean river breaking out at the hill-side than 
that of a spring. It is about three hundred yards long, varying 
in width from one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet. The 
water has a bluish-green tinge, and is so exceedingly pure that 
a drop of it placed under a microscope would show fewer ani- 
malculse than a drop of river-water would after being filtered. 
Formerly it contained thousands upon thousands of the finest 
brook trout; but of late years the number has been consider- 
ably diminished by the sportsmen who could obtain permis- 
sion from Mr. Spang to entice them from their element with 
the tempting fly. A hundred feet from what is considered 
the end of the spring, there is a large grist-mill driven by its 
waters, which empty into the eastern reservoir of the Penn- 
sylvania Canal, after traversing a distance of about three miles. 
Within two miles from the head of the spring, its waters 
furnish motive-power to two grist-mills, a saw-mill, and 
four forges. 

As a singular circumstance in connection with this subject, 
we may mention that, within the memory of some of the older 
inhabitants, a considerable stream of water ran through the 
upper end of Middle Woodbury township, Bedford county ; but 
the spring at the head of it gave out, as well as several other 
springs which fed it, and now scarcely any traces of it 
remain. 



378 



APPENDIX. 



In facilities for teaching the rising generation the counties 
composing the valley are not behind any of their sister coun- 
ties in the State, as the Common School Report for 1855 
proves. 

Ever mindful of the Giver of all good and his manifold 
mercies to mankind, the people of the Juniata region have 
reared fully as many temples to the worship of Almighty God 
as the same number of inhabitants have done in any land 
where the light of the gospel shines. The following table, 
compiled from the census statistics, shows the number of 
churches in 1850 : — 



Baptist 

Christian 

Congi'egational .... 

Episcopal 

Free 

Friends 

German Reformed. 

Lutheran 

Mennonite 

Methodist 

Moravian 

Presbyterian 

Roman Catholic. . , 

Tunker 

Union 

Minor Sects 

Total , 



52 



n 


» 


5 


5 


2 




7 


5 


14 


10 


10 


(i 


2 


•) 


6 


6 


1 


3 




1 


5 






1 



42 



60 



6 


1 




" i" 


1 


o 


8 





5 




5 


5 


22 


""s 


1 


1 


13 


11 


1 


1 


1 










2 



32 



10 



27 



10 



14 
1 



47 



21 
1 
1 
3 
3 
«) 

27 
51 

3 
67 

7 
54 

6 

2 

9 
3 



260 



During the six years that have elapsed since the above sta- 
tistics were taken, quite a number of new churches have been 
erected — probably not less than twenty. Of this number 
four have been erected in Altoona and three in Tyrone City 
alone. 

And now, worthy reader, our voluntarily-assumed task is 
ended. As we glance over the pages of our work, we are 



THE VALLEY AS IT IS. 379 

made painfully aware of the fact that many of the narratives 
given are too brief to be very interesting. This is owing alto- 
gether to the fact that we chose to give unvarnished accounts 
as we received them, broken and unconnected, rather than a 
connected history garnished with di'afts from the imagination. 
In thus steering clear of the shoals of fiction, — on which so 
many historians have wrecked, — we conceive that we have 
only done our duty to those who suggested to us this under- 
taking. 

We are strongly impressed with the idea that a history of 
the early settlement of the valley should have been written a 
quarter of a century ago. Then it might have made a 
volume replete with all the stirring incidents of the times, 
for at that period many of the actors in the trials and strug- 
gles endured were still among us, and could have given 
details; while we were compelled to glean our information 
from persons on the brink of the grave, whose thoughts dwelt 
more upon the future than on the past. 

The modern history of the valley will be a subject for the 
pen of the historian a quarter of a century hence. We have 
given him a hint of some occurrences during the last half 
century ; and for farther particulars, during the next twenty- 
five years, we would refer him to the twenty newspapers 
published in the seven counties, from whose columns alone 
he will be able to compile an interesting history, sparing 
himself the trouble of searching among books, papers, and 
old inhabitants, for incidents that, unfortunately, never were 
recorded. 

The future of the valley no man knoweth. We even tax 
the Yankee characteristic in vain when we attempt to guess 
its future. Many yet unborn may live to see the fires of 
forges and furnaces without number illuminating the rugged 
mountains, and hear the screams of a thousand steam-engines. 
They may live, too, to see the day when population shall 



380 APPENDIX. 

have so increased that the noble stag dare no longer venture 
down from the mountain to slake his thirst at the babbling 
brook, and when the goldeu-hued trout, now sporting in 
every mountain-stream, shall be extinct. But, before that 
'time, there is reason to believe that the present generation, 
in<;luding your historian, will have strutted upon the stage 
the brief hour allotted to them, performed life's pilgrimage, 
and, finally, arrived at 



THE END. 



araoEorrPED at l. johnbon * co. 

PBIL&SfXPBIA. 



I 



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